 When things are new, there will be suspicion of the viability, the veracity, and how they operate. The difficulty would be the change of the mindset. I think we'll have to face it, or else we'll be left behind. When the ECCB introduced or started talking about the cash, we were already thinking about it. Cash will always be there. What we will see is a tilting of the scale, so there will be more digital currency in circulation. The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, ECCB, was the first in the Caribbean region to put out a full suite of polymer notes embedded with features for the blind and visually impaired. The bank has now made history once again with the introduction of a digital currency, the digital EC dollar. The World Economic Forum opines that over the next decade, 70% of all value created will be based on the digital economy. And hence, the ECCB's venture into a digital EC currency is to ensure that we in this aid member state are present in our future. The digital EC dollar is currently in its pilot phase and forms part of the ECCB's strategic plan 2017 to 2021, which aims to help reduce cash usage within the ECCU by 50%, promote greater financial sector stability, and expedite the growth and development of our member countries. What is the digital EC currency, this DXCB? Many persons, the first thing you want to know about your money is security, right? So it is a secure, it's very accessible, accessible whether you have a bank account or not. It's innovative, it's leveraging technology, and it's providing what other alternative electronic payments cannot provide, which is real-time settlement. The only other payment instrument that provides real-time settlement is cash. But we know cash is sometimes cumbersome. You have to have storage, you have to think about the security of it when you're moving around with it. It is costly to move around. And so what we have done is said, what are the pain points for consumers, businesses, institutions? And how can we address the pain points by making more efficient payment systems? And we say money makes the world go round. Well, the speed at which money goes around helps to drive efficiencies into our institutions and into our economy. So if we can have a faster payment instrument that is secure, then we are helping to transform our economies and to make them very much appropriate to drive the growth and all of the expectations and aspirations of our people. COVID-19 has propelled discussions around the digital currency and cashless transactions, not only for hygiene and social distancing reasons, but also for the swiftness, efficiency and comfort of successfully completing business transactions. But is the local banking and business community in favour or prepared for this digital revolution? I know now it's going to be a very difficult situation because this is a new normal that's coming up and I suspect the world is changing in a new kind of order. And I suspect because of COVID, this is going to propel this thing forward. And I think that's why I'm saying that we need to be prepared. How are we going to get prepared is the question that we need to ask. And I think that without the shadow of a doubt, the vendors will have to prepare for that thing there. It's not nothing that you can escape. It's just like, you know, you will have to see, induce some people. I'd say, if they bring a vaccine for whatever, I don't want vaccines. I don't deal with vaccines, but it's okay when you have to travel to go abroad, you need to be vaccinated. How are you going to do that? And how are you going to travel? Then you must be vaccinated, get the vaccine for you to be trapped. So in the same way, you want to be in business, you won't be able to go to a store anymore, abroad in the United States and just take something and go to the cashier. This thing will be something of the past. You would have to have some kind of code or some whatever, whatever, and so on. So I am aware of the situation and how the world is developing. For a matter of fact, certain parts in the world, they are very well advanced in that regard. So we must, we cannot be left behind. We shouldn't be left behind. We have to come on board and we must join the bandwagon. But I think what must be done, we have organizations out there, the vendors' association is willing to work with government agencies, government institutions, other NGO organizations and so on. And to try to really see how we can get the vendors to understand that this is the new era that we all have to face. I think we have to look at the demographic. We have to look at the realities of the people. We continue to have a large rural community. We continue to have people who are not very familiar or a large percentage of the population who is not familiar or a community with the technology. When things are new, there will be suspicion of their viability, their veracity and how they operate. So I think that in introducing and moving forward, we have to do a lot of education and information sharing. We have to do a lot of demonstrations. We have to build confidence in the system. The banking sector sometimes gets flack for having not really reaching out and providing to those at the lower end. And also there's always a perception that the larger businesses and the larger financial institutions have an advantage over the small consumer. And so there needs to be that type of confidence-building protection and systems to ensure that persons are not taking advantage of, that persons are able to utilize the system in a way that they understand and not shortchange. So I think these things have to be part of the package of introduction. And I think if we could do that, people will buy into it. There will be some who will always be hesitant and reluctant. But they might think I'm with a young population that is very progressive. I think we will see it get into the mainstream. When the ECCB introduced or started talking about DeCache, we were already thinking about it. Because as I had mentioned before, our ethos, our new positioning tells us that the demographic is a younger demographic. A demographic that is tech-savvy. A demographic that wants to do business now. A demographic that is not interested in necessarily interfacing in a banking all or face-to-face environment. And again, it comes in timely because the entire financial services environment, the onset of COVID has changed. And members, recognizing that what members want, we are engaged of quite a few vendors before. In their personal capacity, offering cashless services or online services. And we thought that because we are an institution that is so heavily focused on our reputation, that we wanted a partner that was reliable and that had a good reputation in the financial services environment. And when we heard about it with the central bank, we were very, very excited. We thought, ah, this is the perfect partner because the central bank is the governance structure of the entire OECS and the ECCU. And we thought, what better opportunity than to partner with the central bank being the largest credit union within Senusha and one of the largest within the OECS. We thought that would have been a perfect marriage for our institution. So here came DeCache. So as soon as the opportunity was available, we signed on. This is the most advanced in terms of digital currency. There's something about it that is very exciting, which is peer-to-peer transaction. And what peer-to-peer does is that it allows you to transform money from anybody who signed on to the platform. So again, there's no need to go to a bank to do a wire transfer. And it's all free. So what better opportunity for a general forward-thinking institution to really show what we're made of, to understand that as an institution, we are the best, we are forward-thinking and we understand where the market is going and what our members want. Prior to this year, which we all know is a phenomenal year, we embarked on a journey in terms of introducing more technology to get our customers out of the bank and to bring the services to them because we recognize time is of value to everyone and they shouldn't be spending their time on a line. So we've made enhancements for our services to bring the technology to them where they can be out of the banking hall. So when we look at our mobile and online banking platforms, some of the plans we have for our ATMs, it really takes away from the queuing. And what COVID has presented us with is an opportunity now to fast-track a lot of these developments. So we're doing a lot more via those channels. We should be releasing, offering our customers soon, enhancements to our mobile and online banking platform where they will be able to do wire transfers from the comfort of their homes, pair-to-pair transfers as well too without having to come into the bank to do the necessary debit and credit that can be done comfortably in paying back a friend to loan or family member, etc. They will also be able to transfer funds to anybody within the ECCU banking space, again from the comfort of their home or their mobile device. And really at this time, it's an efficient user time because it pains me to see the queues outside the bank, whether it's our bank or any other bank on Ireland or even some of the other utility companies and supermarkets because it's really how effectively people use time and in this fast-paced world, we all want it now. So if we can bring those services to customers where they can do these things in the comfort of their home, a parent can get up at two o'clock in the morning and send through a wire transfer for a child who may be at university halfway across the world or even within our own region here at UWE rather than having to get time off to come into the bank the following day to take a line and to do a wire transfer. So it's really recognising the value of importance to our customers and offering them the technology platforms that will facilitate that. The public transport sector has for some time now been working to develop its own cashless payment platforms. Well over the years what we've had is a lot of robbery against the bus drivers as well as the passengers and based on these issues or events we felt it necessary to go into a cashless system. Obviously it has had its challenges in terms of how do we get the finance to do that but presently we are at least in discussion with a few vendors and investors to see that we implement that system. The benefits to that is the security aspect, the comfort, the modernisation of the sector also would be why we are pushing it but more so because that's how the world is going and if the world is going that direction we need to go along with it so that transportation would be an easy thing for anybody, a visitor, a local the young people being more computer savvy would be able to use that system and the bus operator would profit more. It would save them more time, they wouldn't have to go to the bank they can monitor the transaction online, right on their phone they don't have to carry the cash, the cash would just be there and then they just have to see that it is there and decide how to spend it. Likewise with the bank we are currently finalising preparations for a similar solution which goes beyond just the transportation sector and there are a couple other sectors and government agencies that we've been discussing that with in terms of providing them with plastic because plastic really is the ideal means now of conducting business rather than walking with large sums of cash and it also provides some level of tracking of your expenditure so it's a product that we are currently finalising and hopefully COVID had us tempered our aggressiveness this year so hopefully we should be able to speak more to that in the coming year but in terms of the initiative being pursued by the transportation sector it's one I think they can still push ahead with notwithstanding the efforts of the central bank in terms of the DeCache initiative. We would have to review it and see which one is best because we would rather go with a system that has been tried and proven and we also would want to know we are with a system that has credibility so definitely I'll engage again the ECB to see how we can work as partners to effect a change like that and so it's that issue of trust in the ECB currency which gives confidence to our currency whether it's digital or physical in a cryptocurrency no one has that liability or that guarantee and that is a distinction so when you're talking about digital currencies understand that a sovereign currency from a central bank is completely distinct from a private currency whether it's in digital form or not issued by a private entity With the current ubiquitous nature of cashless transactions coupled with the introduction of the digital EC dollar will physical cash transactions soon be a thing of the past? Our intention is not to get rid of cash No, we want to reduce cash to a point at which we have an optimal level of cash but it will continue to co-circulate with physical EC notes and coins with other payment instruments like your debit cards and your credit cards we're hoping however that we'll reduce the use of checks and we'll reduce the use of physical notes and coins Our objective is to get cash down by 50% and to reduce significantly the use of checks their costly, the whole idea of reconciliation and chasing bad checks takes up resources that could be put to more productive use as opposed to transactional use Cash will always be there What we will see is a tilting of the scale so there will be more digital currency in circulation rather than the fiat currency as we currently know it and part of the reason the central bank gave in introducing that was one to reduce their cost of operations because the cost of fiat currency is expensive the printing, the transportation of it to the eight member countries of the ECCU the security as a business because the central bank is a business so they've looked at that and said we're going to reduce that operational cost and become more efficient by reducing the amount of fiat currency we have in circulation and introducing X level amount of digital When the central bank started this project they wanted a few central banks globally to undertake that or embark upon that and since they've done that it's about 80% now of central banks globally are actually exploring or at some stage in the process of introducing digital currencies and the exciting thing is not only from the consumer side in terms of being able to transact digitally quicker, safer but also from the correspondent banking side and the AML side because with every digital transaction it's traceable it is not that traceable for fiat currency because if you're in a questionable trade and you're holding all this cash and you have it stored there there is no way of tracing it but once you enter the digital realm every transaction leaves a fingerprint if you want to call it and once you have that you're then able to trace the sources or the parties involved in a transaction so it helps with the fight against AML and also in terms of our great challenge of correspondent banking it will facilitate that because the correspondent banks are really concerned about the AML aspect and the customers that we deal with but in a digital world where these things can be traced there will be greater lapsing of the tight strung hole that they have on us and we'll be able to transact business better as we explore the pluses and minuses of embracing the innovation in the financial and banking sector a few questions come to mind will the digital EC dollar and the many advances in cashless transactions mean a reduction in jobs in the financial sector will stakeholders embrace the possibilities presented for doing business in the digital economy and what would it take for solutions to fully embrace this new modality there will always be a need for tellers because our demographics are broad we have the more senior citizens or customers who will still want to come in and interact with a teller I mean it doesn't mean some of them are not using the online and mobile technology but some prefer the interaction with a physical body in terms of the reduction in jobs no what we will find is that the jobs evolve so with the user technology we can reskill or retrain persons in other aspects of operations so what they would have been doing as a manual basis that is going to be automated but some of those skills will be required in other areas of the business and that is where we will retrain persons to provide those services for me as an operator I would rather just know that my money is there my passengers cannot be robbed for finance for money they can only be robbed for the chain or for the phone I can only be robbed maybe because of my phone or my chain or my jewelry if I want to see with the digital that is the benefit it gives us the second benefit would be because your money goes into the bank and now you have to go and get it it means that the bank has a clearer idea of your income on a daily basis so when it comes to loans it shows a better paper trail for you and from that aspect you can or we can to a certain extent deal and the bank will be much more happier with us going through a system like that it's about the competitiveness of the region at the central bank we have established that we want to be in the top 50 in the ranking of ease of doing business think St. Lucia is around 93 from 2019 so you're far still from 50 but you are the closest there because at the other spectrum we have St. Kitts at 140 Grenada 147 somewhere around there but 93 is not where our target is it's at 50 and part of the ease of doing business is what is the architecture for persons to transact in businesses to get access to credit to open a business and it's a digital economy that will allow for this transformation and so the digital EC currency, the DXCD is part of this entire framework and vision of an ECCU digital economy we are not prepared, I can tell you we're probably almost into 0% maybe it's because I think it's a level of people so accustomed that they see their money when they're counting their money they know how much money they're going home with when the day is over so they're so used to that it's almost what's difficult for me when I decided that we all could put some money together I spoke to the people at the banks and so on they said how much it would cost to put up the machine and so on and how much each vendor must contribute so that they could use the machine some people have the view, okay put up the machine and then when it's up we'll decide we'll sell and we'll pay for the transaction and you can't do it so we wanted to make sure you have enough money to put the machine up you have to pay for the rental of the machine then you'll get your percentage then the bank will take your percentage and this is the situation where we had to deal with and no one was ready for that we went around and then people came to the meeting we discussed the matter but no one took it seriously the very nature of our people says that change happens very slowly because of the dynamics around DeCache everybody will not transition at the same time people will transition at different times as they gain comfort with the system and so persons will have DeCache as well as credit cards because not all merchants will transfer or make the transition at the same time so you'll still need to have a debit card so again I see it as a good complementary services a good bank or a good FI understands the environment and adjust the products and the strategy accordingly you don't work around DeCache you have to work with DeCache and understand how your other services and products can sign and use DeCache for growth and sustainability well I don't really believe that what we need to do is to convince people and to show them how it works and to explain it in ways that are practical and tangible in how they benefit we must be aware that we need to ensure that we do not create more doubt in their minds in the language we use the terms we use and the manner we introduce it and not to thrust it upon them but rather to educate, inform and convince them by demonstration by hand holding by giving them simple opportunities to utilize showing them how in the most difficult times that they experience how they too can be part of it show them how that it does not take away but actually adds to their ability to participate in this economy when things are new there will be suspicion of their viability, their veracity and how they operate the difficulty would be the change of the mindset I think we have to face it or else we'll be left behind introduce or start talking about the cash we were already thinking about it cash will always be there what we will see is a tilting of the scale so there will be more digital currency in circulation