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Fed is studying tokenization, smart contracts, and AI in payments, says Governor Waller
The Federal Reserve is studying cutting-edge innovations, including tokenization, smart contracts, and artificial intelligence, to see how their payment systems might benefit from these technologies, Fed Governor Christopher Waller said today at the Wyoming Blockchain Symposium 2025. Waller noted that bank regulators are collaborating with industry leaders to learn about emerging technologies as well as assess how they could improve payments. He emphasized the importance of collaboration with innovators, especially as the traditional financial sector overlaps more with digital assets and crypto. On stablecoins, ... (full story)
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On today's episode of CNBC Crypto World, bitcoin's losses slow while ether rebounds. Plus, Fed Governor Christopher Waller tells Wyoming Blockchain Symposium attendees that the central bank should embrace innovation like blockchain technology. And, Nelli Zaltsman, head of platform settlement solutions at Kinexys by JPMorgan, discusses the blockchain ...
Thank you for inviting me to speak today on payments innovation. It is an exciting time to work in payments. While I have always been interested in the topic, I would have never imagined decades ago that payments would generate this amount of enthusiasm, where now some of the coolest jobs in tech are working in this area. The payment system is experiencing what I have called a "technology-driven revolution," where the latest advances in computing power, data processing, and distributed networks have fueled growth in innovative new payment services. This includes 24/7 instant payments, user-friendly digital wallets and mobile payment apps, and stablecoins and other digital assets. Alongside these new services sits enabling technology, such as artificial intelligence (AI), that has the potential to improve the precision and efficiency of the underlying payment products even further. While there has been a lot of excitement, and admittedly sometimes hype, around the possibilities of these new technologies, there have also been some who have been fearful or skeptical of innovation in this space. But we only have to look to history to see that the evolution of the payment system has long been a story of technological advancement. In any payment transaction, three things happen. First, an object is bought and paid for with another object. Second, there is a technology for conducting this transaction. Finally, there is a technology for recording the history of the transaction and ownership of the objects. For example, I can go to the grocery store and buy an apple and use a digital dollar in my checking account to pay for it. I tap my debit card on a card reader to conduct the transaction. Fed's Waller does not comment on monetary policy or economic outlook in prepared remarks to payments conference. Fed's Waller: The Fed is conducting research on tokenization and AI in payments.
