Does the European Central Bank want to end cash? This is wrongly claimed by a video widely relayed on TikTok and Facebook. “Christine Lagarde announces for 2027 the end of the euro paper currency! », exclaims the author of this montage, shared nearly 12,000 times on TikTok since November 30. The video begins with an excerpt from an interview with the President of the European Central Bank (ECB) on BFMTV, where it starts with a digital euro.
“What does it mean concretely, for those watching us, a digital euro? asks the journalist to Christine Lagarde. “It is the same value as a banknote, replies the President of the ECB, in this interview of February 2021. You have a 20 euro note, you can very well have 20 euros in digital form, which you can circulate between your bank, merchants etc. »
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This digital euro, which is only at the project stage for the moment, is not intended to replace coins and banknotes definitively: “it would complement cash, without replacing them”, assured to many times Christine Lagarde and the ECB.
The idea is to be able to pay with purchases in shops, without restricting the possibility of paying in cash.
The CNIL requires respect for privacy
This digital euro aims to respond to the boom in dematerialized payments, explains the Central Bank. The challenge is also to “support monetary sovereignty and strategic autonomy [de la zone euro], had explained in September François Villeroy de Galhau, the Governor of the Banque de France, by preventing external digital assets – such as private crypto-assets and digital currencies from non-European central banks – from being used as settlement assets”.
Clearly, we must respond to Bitcoin and China, which is in the process of launching its own digital currency. The ECB denies creating its Bitcoin there: the value of this dematerialized euro “would be guaranteed by a central bank”, where cryptocurrencies are not backed by state systems. The ECB assures that this euro should “respect privacy and confidentiality of data”.
A point that alerts: the CNIL wish a “public debate” on this dematerialization and calls for “solutions that preserve privacy”. It recommends, with other European data protection authorities, the preservation of a “space of anonymity”, “for example below a certain threshold for everyday transactions”, like transactions in species. It also recommends that private companies not be able to trace these transactions.
Unlike cash, which serves as a payment and financial investment, this digital euro should not be able to be used as an investment, in order to preserve the role of retail banks.
In a survey published in 2019 by the ECB, 59% of in-store purchases in France were settled with cash, compared to 73% in the euro area as a whole. 35% of in-store transactions were paid for with a bank card in France. Even if they draw their bank card to pay large sums, the French remain attached to cash and continue to trust it more than their bank card, according to a survey carried out by Ifop in 2021. This is one of the challenges that the ECB will have to meet if it wants to bring its digital euro project to fruition.