FILE PHOTO: Deputy Governor of the Bank of England Jon Cunliffe holds a news conference after the bank issued its latest Financial Stability Report at Bank Of England in London, Britain December 13, 2022 Leon Neal/Pool via REUTERS
LONDON (Reuters) - British consumers would be limited to holding a maximum of 20,000 pounds ($24,000) each if the Bank of England goes ahead with a digital version of the British currency, BoE Deputy Governor Jon Cunliffe said on Tuesday.
Britain's government said on Monday that it and the BoE were pressing on with work on a possible digital pound that was likely to enter circulation in the second half of this decade, though no final decision has been made on whether to go ahead.
"We propose a limit of between 10,000 pounds and 20,000 pounds per individual as the appropriate balance between managing risks and supporting wide usability of the digital pound," Cunliffe said in a speech to members of UK Finance, a banking industry body.
A limit of 10,000 pounds would mean that three quarters of people could receive their pay in digital pounds as well as holding pre-existing balances in the same account, while a 20,000 pound limit would allow almost everyone to use digital pounds for day-to-day transactions, Cunliffe said.
($1 = 0.8332 pounds)
(Reporting by Huw Jones, editing by David Milliken)
