ECB’s Nagel: Digital Euro Introduction Could Take Four to Five Years

6 November 2023

By Isabel Teles – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Joachim Nagel on Monday said that despite entering a new phase in November, it could still take years before the digital euro was introduced for regular use.

In a speech in Darmstadt, Germany, a text of which was posted to the website of the German Bundesbank, which he heads, Nagel said that he ‘wouldn't expect that [digital euro introduction] to happen for four to five years at the earliest’.

The digital euro could have a positive effect geopolitically and ‘further strengthen Europe's sovereignty in payment transactions’, he said.

With the digital euro, it would however be necessary to ‘avoid the central bank's footprint in the financial system becoming too large’, he said.

‘The Eurosystem should not become a commercial bank for the citizens of Europe’, he said. ‘Because our goal is not to replace commercial banks. Our goal is to anchor the role of state money in the digital world in the long term.’