The President of the island nation of Palau, Surangel Whipps Jr., stated on December 26th that Palau and Ripple, an enterprise crypto company, had collaborated to create a national stablecoin.
It was revealed during a virtual discussion secession about Web 3.0, Metaverse and the future of blockchain, in which the President participated.
The show’s host and Senior Reporter for Crypto at Bloomberg News, Joanna Ossinger, asked the President about his digital assets strategy. He discussed the nation’s stablecoin initiative and policy on the digital residence.
The President said that the Global Community can now get a digital identity from Palau due to the nation’s approval of the Digital Residency Act last year. It has been generating enthusiasm since it was unveiled, but there is still a need to increase the range of its offerings.
One of the key components of this program for digital residents is the stringent KYC procedure that any participant in Palau’s economy must go through virtually to become a resident of the digital world.
According to Surangel’s statement:
Palau is also taking a step in collaborating with Ripple to explore the creation of national stablecoin, which we hope to launch soon which will help make payments easy and secure.
Ripple Will Help Strengthen Island’s Economy
In response to Joanna’s question on the Central Bank Digital Currencies, Surangel emphasizes that the CBDC concept really originated with cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. The official currency of Palau is the US dollar; the country itself does not have a central bank.
He said:
In developing our collaboration with Ripple, our goal is to have a USD-backed stablecoin, which is really a step toward our own Central Bank Digital Currency, you could say. We feel that this is important and it will help make Fiat on ramping easier.
Palau has gained recognition from many of the world’s largest crypto exchanges, including CZ, CEO and founder of Binance. When CZ visited recently, the President claimed that they discussed the possibility of collaborating on Palau’s new digital residency program as well as using Binance Pay for transactions between Palauans.
According to him, their digital residents will also have access to financial services, and offerings will be made simpler through Binance Pay alternatives. However, by working together with Ripple and Binance, they can strengthen Island’s economy and can grow the crypto ecosystem.
He also had a virtual meeting with Vitalik Buterin from Ethereum to discuss ways to make the R&S ID ecosystem more accessible to developers and how Palau’s digital residency may relate to the idea of so-bound ID systems.
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