Boston Fed and MIT Publish CBDC Technical Research

The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have jointly published their long-awaited technical research and open-source code for a potential central bank digital currency (CBDC). The 35-page white paper is part of a joint initiative announced in August 2020. Dubbed Project Hamilton, the phase of the project ‘focuses on technological experimentation and does not aim to create a usable CBDC for the United States.’ The researchers also released the open-source code for Project Hamilton which is available in github for contributions. Overall, they found that the system was capable of handling 1.7 million transactions per second, while the vast majority of transactions were able to settle in under two seconds. As a whole, the researchers said they met their goal of creating a core processing engine for a potential general-purpose CBDC. Commenting on the development, Boston Fed Executive Vice President and Interim Chief Operating Officer Jim Cunha said: “It is critical to understand how emerging technologies could support a CBDC and what challenges remain. This collaboration between MIT and our technologists has created a scalable CBDC research model that allows us to learn more about these technologies and the choices that should be considered when designing a CBDC.” Boston Fed, MIT Research Separate from the US Fed Over the next few years, MIT and the Boston Fed said the second phase of ...