The financial heads of G7 countries met on Monday during the 12th meeting of the G7 finance officials hosted by U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to talk about cryptocurrencies and their impact on the financial ecosystem. The virtual meeting was attended by the Finance Ministers and Central Bankers from these countries who strongly advocated for regulating the nascent cryptocurrency space. However, the growing demand for regulations among G7 nations arises from the fear of private digital currencies taking over national fiat.
During the virtual meet, this was quite evident from the comments made by the German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz while talking about Facebook’s upcoming stablecoin which was recently renamed to Diem and expected to launch early next year in the USA. Scholz believed that the entry of private players such as Facebook in the financial world would run havoc on the sovereignty of national fiat and that is why they would not allow the launch of Diem in Europe and Germany. He said,
“A wolf in sheep’s clothing is still a wolf, It is clear to me that Germany and Europe cannot and will not accept its entry into the market while the regulatory risks are not adequately addressed.”
Moving forward Scholz added that they must do everything possible to keep the currency monopoly in the hands of the States.
The German Finance Minister today, “We must do everything possible to make sure the currency monopoly remains in the hands of states.”
— Blockfolio (@blockfolio) December 7, 2020
G7 Nations Worried About Financial Sovereignty?
The comments made by the German Finance minister indicate that governments are more worried about their financial sovereignty than the positive crypto regulations which is understandable as more private players have shown interest in private digital currency. The latest example is Standard Chartered who believes there is a scope for both private and state-owned digital currencies.
2020 for sure would be recorded in history as one of the worst years in modern history owing to the raging pandemic which is still going on, however, at the same time, the year would also be remembered as the threshold point for mainstream crypto adoption. While the governments are still discussing regulations to ensure financial sovereignty, traditional firms such as MicroStrategy and Paypal have already started to hint where the future lies, i.e Bitcoin.
