Project Sand Dollar is a new initiative occurring in the Bahamas that seeks to “tokenize” the fiat currency issued by the Central Bank of the Bahamas (CBOB). As crypto continues to take over the financial spectrum, many have lost sight of fiat and are looking to digitize everything.
The Bahamas: The Latest Crypto Tech Hub
Now, the CEO of transactions firm NZIA Ltd. is claiming that the tech startups in the nation will have to serve at the front lines and potentially lead the development of Project Sand Dollar. The tokenization of the fiat currency is slated to occur at the end of this year.
The CEO is named Jay Joe, and he’s got some very big ideas about what needs to be done. He thinks one of the big contributing factors to the project’s success will be cooperation from local banks, along with small and “medium-sized enterprises.” He also feels entrepreneurs in “CBDC implementation” will play a huge role in the project moving forward.
However, he claims that local startups are the most likely to use the tokenized money, which means they’ll be pivotal in potentially driving the movement forward. He claims:
We are going to build the back end and we will open up the front end to allow local entrepreneurs, tech startups, whoever to be able to build new products and create new services around CBDC. We feel that this is going to be a key aspect of really making the thing become a real, living, breathing thing that people engage in.
The Central Bank of the Bahamas ultimately entered into an agreement with NZIA on May 30 that would allow the corporation to tokenize the fiat. It recently named NZIA as it’s “preferred technology solutions provider” in early March.
Plans to tokenize the money were announced back at the Bahamas Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Conference in June 2018, meaning this goal has been almost a year in the making. At the time, Deputy Prime Minster of Finance of the Bahamas K. Peter Turnquest said that tokenizing all money for island nations was extremely important:
A digital Bahamian currency is especially important for the many family islands as they have seen many commercial banks downsize and pull out of their communities, leaving them without banking services. As an island nation, where transportation can be an inconvenient for many, especially the elderly, and costly, we must offer financial services digitally and securely.
Will Tokenization Become the New Norm?
Interestingly, the Bahamas isn’t the only region considering full tokenization of fiat in the future. Recently, Live Bitcoin News discussed a report that the United States, one of the largest and most powerful nations in the world, was considering a “cashless” society that was no longer dominated by paper money but rather digital coins.