Many in retirement are travelling comfortably, with three key factors contributing to their happiness – good physical and mental health and enough money to enjoy life.
Perhaps the assumption that markets are still anchored by predictable economic policies needs to be challenged. For the first time since the fall of the Berlin Wall, political volatility – once background noise – is potentially reshaping investment risk at a structural level.
ANZ launched a ‘stable coin’, why does it matter?
ANZ has leapfrogged its competition to become the first bank in the world to mint a stable coin that is pegged to the Australian dollar.
A stable coin is a digital asset designed to keep its value stable in relation to another asset. The landmark transaction is a sign of approval and vote of confidence that cryptocurrency is here to stay and accepted. Australian banks are among the most reputable ad trust worthy banks in the world. That means there’s no reason why A$DC shouldn’t hold its peg against the Aussie dollar.
It’s the first time a bank has minted a digital asset linked to the value of the Australia dollar and used in a real transaction. ANZ confirmed the stable coin was delivered to Victor Smorgon Group via Zerocap, a private wealth management firm for digital assets.
ANZ has minted 30 million of A$DC using an ANZ-built Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible smart contract deployed through the Fireblocks platform. The move is widely expected to give ANZ a massive boost to credibility, and will put pressure on the remaining big three banks to follow suit. CBA will soon join ANZ with a digital currency. It has already seen the benefits of creating a “programmable currency” so that it can participate in the “tokenisation” of assets.
The RBA is also looking at creating a central bank digital currency (CBDC).
Eventually the A$DC should be listed on Australian-licensed crypto exchanges to help assist with digital asset transactions in retail markets.
At the moment there are a few ‘stable coins’ that have been issued by private firms but these have been unable to gain the enough confidence to be listed on exchanges. The ANZ-issued stable coin, however, because it’s built on the Ethereum blockchain and has that confidence attached to it, should be quickly made available across major exchanges.
Banks are considered to be the perfect fit for an AUD stable coin.
