Topic: How long will it take banks to phase out physical cash completely? - page 11. (Read 4133 times)

That remains to be seen

I don't know where you are from, and the life expectancy in your country may well be substantially below the average lifespan in developed countries, after all. But since phasing out physical cash is mostly a task for advanced countries, with good healthcare and high living standards, people born in 1970's will be 75 years old by 2050 (again, on average). That's not much unless we succumb to something by far more lethal than today's Covid-19 in the coming years. If anything, Trump is 74 years old now, and it doesn't look like he is going to kick the bucket any time soon. So don't be surprised to see him still sticking around in 2050

Eventually. I do not mean right now, but eventually. Because the world has always constantly changed and I do not think finance is any different, that changed a lot as well. That is why I think even if not 100% clear of cash, we will eventually be pure digital, without ever spending cash anywhere except some weird people or very old people.

I would say 2050 is a good goal to pick, that would be people who were born in 1960's and 1970's mostly dead at that time (sure some people alive but very small percentage) so everything who was born after 80's would probably not feel the need to spend money in cash, almost all of them already spend it with either credit card or crypto right now, the number of people who was born after 1980's and still use cash as a standard option (not when they have to but they want to) must be close to people who own bitcoin.

I'm not really sure but the financial system or progress of a country is very different so even if later it has been implemented in a country, then other countries may not necessarily be able to implement the policy, we know that digital use will indeed occur later, but it won't be possible everywhere all at once.

I feel like there will be a moment when the technology is so advanced that people who were born before 1970's will not be alive so the adoption would be a lot easier and everyone will be adopting to whatever the newest technology is. At that moment we could start to see some crazy stuff that we can't even imagine right now.

People who are over 60 years old right now have hard time paying stuff from mobile, let alone get into crypto, so it is understandable that they would have hard time adopting to something new that would remove cash all together, yet there will be time when they are no longer with us which would open up a lot of doors. Hell even buying stuff online was something "dangerous" for a long time and now it is common as drinking it water so I am sure it will be fine.

It depends on the country, there are many first wold countries in which cash is barely used while there are countries with similar economic power in which people still prefer to use cash for their transactions, however as times passes and the older generations begin to pass away and begin to be replaced by other generations I think we are going to see an even bigger decrease in the amount of cash that is used but even then I do not think we are ever going to see cash to disappear completely.

I don't have any issue, if the governments and the banks phase out physical cash in a voluntary manner. But what happening now is the opposite. They are forcing the citizens to go for online mode of payment, so that the anonymity can be breached. Physical cash remain as the most anonymous form of payment. None of the cryptocurrencies can match the anonymity being offered by physical cash. 

5-10 years? That is very short. Bitcoin or crypto has been here a decade and yet only small percentage of global population has the grasp of using it. Maybe in another 5-10 years time, the adoption will increase. But phasing out fiat money? that is very unlikely to happen. Just think of those people who are still unbanked up until today and those that have no connections with internet. So yes, it may take decades and decades before we will see high percentage of population that are into digital currency. But there will always be people who will stay unbanked, and not connected with digital community.

Woow...
It looks like you are seeing the future. I don't know what is your basis for this but, to be honest, 5-10 years is not enough to completely dissolve physical and turn into digital transformation. In fact, many places are still out of the internet connection or if they have but they don't have any gadgets to use(third world countries). And how this cashless mode of payment will be fair and comfortable for everyone?

I don't disclose any possibility to make it happen but it takes decades, or until such time that national banks won't print paper money anymore. But for now, we are just considering this as another option cause I know, once this pandemic will be over people will turn back into using fiat money again.

I think it will take approximately 5-10 years. They will need 1-3 years for developing the project and the same time for implementing it.

Using a cashless payment is just temporary but i believed that after the covid 19 pandemic,using a physical cash will return to normal existence. It is easy for the banks to issue again a fiat money after the end of pandemic but the process of phasing out is difficult because all people are using it and holding it.

Phasing out physical cash does not mean forgetting the history of its currency, and does not mean that the government will turn its back on its national currency.  As we know, cash not only appear in physical forms but also in Digital form,  In this thread, we are talking about physical cash and not about cash in its entirety.   Besides, it will be a step by step procedure until people see that physical cash became bothersome.

To my knowledge, CBDCs will not be using blockchain

I agree that first proposals around 2015-2016 (e.g. by the Bank of England) mentioned blockchain, up to a point of actually suggesting to use it as their backbone value transfer system. CBDCs were in fact inspired by Bitcoin and its technology. However, from what we now know, the real implementations won't be based on blockchain. Seriously, what's in it for central bankers? In my opinion, they would do just fine with centralized solutions

I do not think that they will give up cash, cash also tells the history of the country and shows the value of a country. So getting rid of cash quickly is a wrong decision and will affect a lot of poor people or those who don't know about technology. I don't really support this project because it causes a lot of inconvenience and I'm only used to using cash. Technology is good but not all fields should be technologyized.

I think it would take some time, still a lot of years, IMO.

As there are countries that are technologically advanced, there are those that isn't. Some countries might apply this but there will always be a part of that country that will not adapt that so quickly. The same with countries that are having a hard time making their transactions online.

Also, there are those people that are not computer illiterate, I guess millenials will be the first ones to completely use digital transactions in the future.

Exactly. Physical cash transactions are mostly "under the radar", leaving banks without the chance for profiting off fees from its users. Not to mention, some people use physical cash for tax evasion. With CBDCs in play, this is no longer possible. Things will be worse for everyday people, as a CBDC increases surveillance by central banks and governments alike. There will be no such thing as privacy once a new banking system living on Blockchain technology is established in the future.

As far as using CBDCs in the mainstream world, I think there's a long way to go as there are still people using physical cash for daily transactions. Most elder people are reluctant to change, even when technology improves our lives for the better. While young people will quickly adapt to the latest trends in technology, they're still the minority. Maybe a couple of decades from now (30 years, perhaps?), we'll be able to experience a fully-digital economy empowered by central banks' own Blockchain ledger. There's still room for growth, as Blockchain is an experimental technology. With governments becoming so interested in digital currencies of their own due to the impact of COVID-19 in the mainstream economy, it should not be long before the whole world becomes fully digitized. Just my thoughts

If we maximize the development of technology maybe soon but it will take a lot of years before it happens. Using smartphones is still not normalize in other countries and there are still people who lives in the traditional ways that use cash as payment. But as we foresee the future, a cashless society is really possible but it requires a lot before it'll be implemented.

The majority should also agree with using digital money and I doubt that all of them will agree since some don't have reliable sources of internet connection. Actually, there's a lot of apps now that can be used in an online transaction like online banking. So if they add more features to it, it's really possible and banks will surely phase out physical money if all users are into online banking.

People already know how important that cash is, this is not in doubt. And I don't think cash will go away because the use of it is enormous in humanity. I expect that banks will adopt bitcoin to make payment faster since the countries are now going digital.

Of course not. They'd be losing business from people who only operate on a cash basis. There are plenty of people who get paid in cash or operate cash businesses, not just "the unbanked." It's an important market, at least in the US.

That's not to say there isn't a shift occurring though. In my opinion, the spread of germs via physical cash is a secondary concern. The big weakness the COVID-19 crisis revealed is the inability to quickly infuse cash into the economy via the banking system. It can take months to get on the unemployment rolls in times like these. 3 months after stimulus checks started getting issued, people are still waiting to receive them. There have been massive delays in processing of emergency small business loans.

That's why central banks are so interested all of a sudden. Their biggest fear is a deflationary spiral, an economic depression, and they know a CBDC would allow them to infuse cash where they need to exponentially faster than the current system of bureaucracy and banks. That holds a lot of value for them.

It depends actually. But surely that would take a lot of years like decades before banks can completely phase out all the physical cash because it is not an easy discussion to phase out all paper money for there are processes that are needed to attend with before coming up into a decision. Of course that would take a legal assistance and an opinion from the people because many people are still reliant and wanted to use physical money than digital money.

Wanting to phase out all the physical money will need a massive adaption first of digital currency because if you would just implement it without readiness, it won't work out because the decision must be favorable for both the people and the government. There are still traditional people that are not aware on using digital cash (CBDC) for they have already been using physical money for so long. People will surely not agree easily on that shifting from physical money to digital cash and that is what is needed to be considered so it would really take time to convince people before banks can totally phase out physical money and convert it into digital cash instead.

Precisely. For what I know, transitioning from physical cash to digital cash (CBDC) will not be an easy task to achieve. We've got the elderly which are quite skeptical about using technology for their own benefit. Central banks and governments would need to slowly introduce their own CBDCs alongside physical cash until everyone uses digital payments more thoroughly. And as you've said earlier, this could take decades. We might as well enjoy physical cash while it lasts. Once CBDCs completely replaces the current monetary system, anonymity with Fiat will be a thing of the past (due to the Blockchain's transparency). Be aware though, that our economy might remain the same if CBDCs experience inflation. The only difference relative to physical cash will be the ability to make borderless payments within seconds at a fraction of the cost. Banks will mostly benefit from this, instead of the people in the mainstream world.

Given that COVID-19 has encouraged social distancing, it's eliminating the need for people to use physical cash at their favorite retailer or store (since cash carries germs and bacteria). The longer the outbreak takes to disappear in its entirety, the faster CBDCs will become a reality in our society.



Exactly. That's main point of governments worldwide. They want complete control over people's money. And what better way to do so with a global blockchain ledger they're able to manipulate at will? I believe that CBDCs will increase surveillance by said entities while minimizing privacy at every way. It'll be worse than credit/debit cards or payment processors like PayPal. CBDCs will be directly linked to central banks and governments as we speak. Only decentralized cryptocurrencies will provide an alternative for people looking to exit the world's monetary system.

With COVID-19 in play, banks and governments will accelerate the development of a CBDC. Right now, China is in the lead as it's testing it's own digital version of the Chinese Yuan. It'll only be a matter of time before other countries follow. There's no rush for a CBDC if physical cash is still being used worldwide. As millennials embrace digital currencies, we'll live in a future where the world's economy will become completely digitized. Elder people might not be able to experience it, but young ones will. Just my thoughts