Cardano () creator Charles Hoskinson is not a fan of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and even sees them as a threat.
In a recent interview with Cheeky Crypto, Hoskinson argues that CBDCs are the “single-most dangerous innovation that we’ve ever seen in monetary policy.”
“CBDCs… they’re not crypto. They can run on crypto rails and do these things, but I will never in my life support a system where we hand an unlimited monopoly to somebody at any moment to have total control over your entire financial autonomy and your economic access.
Just as an example of what could be done: Let’s just say there’s a country, and I’ll just say country, I won’t put a name on it. And there’s a civil war going on in that country between two ethnic groups. So it’s entirely possible when you have a CBDC that the majority party — the one that runs the government that’s oppressing the other group — can just say, ‘You know what, we’re just going to shut off all the money of everybody who’s of this ethnic minority. Just going to turn it off.’ They wake up, their wallets are empty.”
The Cardano creator also notes that a permanent record of CBDC transactions could destroy a person’s privacy and open them up to censorship and oppression if they ever purchased things considered unapproved by their government.
