In a financial era defined by digital innovation, the Trump administration’s outright rejection of a U.S. Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) has sparked fierce debate. President Donald Trump’s Executive Order on January 23, 2025, titled “Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology” banned the “establishment, issuance, circulation, and use” of a CBDC within the United States. Was this a masterstroke fostering private innovation and US leadership in Digital Finance or a strategic blunder that could cost the United States its financial dominance?
Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), at their core, promise a range of benefits, including enhanced financial inclusion, more efficient transactions, and greater monetary policy control. The Trump administration has rejected embracing a state-backed digital currency and has instead doubled down on strengthening the private banking sector and promoting stablecoins as an alternative. Stablecoins, which are digital assets pegged to the dollar but issued by private entities, are viewed by some as a market-friendly alternative to a Federal Reserve-controlled digital currency. The logic? Keep financial power decentralized, minimize government intervention, and allow private innovation to flourish. However, critics argue that this approach could leave the U.S. playing catch-up as global financial systems evolve.
The Trump administration’s aversion to CBDCs appears deeply rooted in ideological concerns over privacy and government overreach. A U.S. CBDC would mean transactions monitored by the Federal Reserve, potentially paving the way for increased government surveillance—a scenario libertarians and conservatives view as dystopian. Trump’s rejection of a CBDC was marketed as a win for individual freedom: no government tracking your spending, no Fed acting as both referee and player in the financial system. It was a nationalist, libertarian dream rolled into one. But was it also a strategic miscalculation?
While Washington opts out of CBDCs, the rest of the world is accelerating. China’s digital yuan is already reshaping global trade, the European Union is laying the groundwork for a digital euro, and smaller economies are experimenting with their CBDCs to reduce reliance on the U.S. dollar. Imagine a world where Africa embraces the digital yuan for trade, Europe cements a digital euro-led economic bloc, and Latin America pivots toward blockchain-based financial settlements. If the U.S. stands still, does it risk losing its economic influence to a fragmented, increasingly multipolar financial order? Some see this as economic decentralization, an overdue shake-up of a dollar-dominated world. Others see chaos – a financial Wild West where competing digital currencies undermine stability. Either way, the stakes couldn’t be higher: the future of money itself hangs in the balance.
By rejecting a government-controlled digital currency, Trump has bet on America’s private sector to maintain its financial edge. Stablecoins, fintech disruptors, and decentralized finance are expected to keep the U.S. competitive. But will that be enough? While Silicon Valley tinkers with blockchain breakthroughs, China is forging trade alliances, Russia is reinforcing alternatives, and Europe is setting regulatory frameworks.
The dollar remains the undisputed king of global finance—for now. The coming decade will decide whether the U.S. remains the world’s financial superpower or becomes one major player in a digital, decentralized financial order. The debate over CBDCs is far from settled, but it underscores the need for thoughtful, collaborative policymaking as the financial world transitions into a digital future.
Prof. C. Justin Robinson, a Vincentian and UWI graduate, holds a BSc in Management Studies, MSc in Finance and Econometrics, and PhD in Finance. With over 20 years at UWI, he has served in various leadership roles, including Dean and Pro Vice Chancellor, Board for Undergraduate Studies. A Professor of Corporate Finance with extensive research publications, he is actively involved in regional financial institutions and is currently the Principal of The UWI Five Islands Campus in Antigua and Barbuda.
Let them bury their heads in the sand still, they too dotish, early on in 2014 a bitcoin initiative was coming, but of course they shunned it away and rather remain poor and beg Skerrit
Before discussing money Dominicans won’t ever have a chance at making in Dominica, maybe we should investigate where the money in Dominica is being misappropriated. Maybe we should investigate all CBI agents via an independent source. Perhaps, we should investigate the people responsible for the country being in such a backwards, downtrodden, dog eat dog state…
Exactly and as mentioned in the article -“Keep financial power decentralized, minimize government intervention, and allow private innovation to flourish.”
Crooks, fraudsters and money launderers do not like oversight, transparency and accountability. Meanwhile, Trump, his wife, Melania, their children and their tech associates are all issuing their own digital coins and memes to the public and making money off the piggybanks of their poor supporters!
No, Trump does not want a US CBDC and the Fed involvement because that would ruin his fraudulent digital business!
Why are you that silly, suggesting, “No, Trump does not want a US CBDC and the Fed involvement because that would ruin his fraudulent digital business” I respect your No but your reason is
ludicrous. Who are the Crooks, fraudsters, and money launderers that do not like oversight, transparency, and accountability, is it Trump or the Central Bank, The Federal Reserve. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vio2CaMW3og
Do you know how the US Central was created, Do you know who owns, it, Do you know how it operates https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXXB8ETjEVc Look at what they have done with the
issuance of paper money. Thomas Jefferson 3rd US president and founding Father of the US told Americans https://ammo.com/articles/founding-fathers-quotes-central-banking-americas-economy. Amsel Rothschilds a proponent of Central Banking
said quote “Let me issue and control a nation’s money and I care not who writes the laws.” get out of that tunnel vision, and understand things.
things.
what would happen de day that de dollar die eh
no need for a crypto coin
If people were self reliant………use their grandfather property to do agriculture growing what we eat. because everyone gotta eat
land for free no real estate developer nor Lord of the land
no need for a bossman
water is free like de air we breathe and de natural sunlight can produce electricity just like the flow of the water
someone better give Trump a lollipop……..he serves it
besides………isn’t Musk the president?
he has all de money he say at least more than Trump.
Is it because he now has one foot in China and one foot in the US government
This term Trump had to bring this team to give him more value
We saw de last term when COVID-19 began.
Trump is taking his orders well this term
Trump can be manipulated
watch out for BRICS
de clock ticking
@dissident
Well BRICS is in with the digital currency.
America will be COMPELLED to follow.
BRICS is the most powerful alliance in the world today.
The day the dollar die. Peter Tosh…Man will need no pocket.
“The establishment of a central bank is 90% of communizing a nation.” (Vladimir Lenin)
Of course that’s a mistake that Trump has made. That’s the way the world is going, whether we like it or not (DIGITAL CURRENCY). Trump cant stop that. America will simply play catch up, as they are doing today with hypersonic missiles, years after both China and Russia have mastered the art. Both Trump and Elon Musk are huge fans of BITCOIN though. Seem like that’s their digital currency. Well America has more than 50 000 000 BITCOIN traders, with millionaires being created everyday. Guess many of those traders helped to put him where he is today.
A MISTAKE!
The problem isn’t inherently a digital currency. Most modern currencies are in fact digital, existing as 1s and 0s in banking computers and transacted by methods other than banknotes. The problem is a centrally monitored, centrally controlled digital currency that can be manipulated to make you richer or poorer – or, if you wrongthink, penniless.
Anybody who thinks giving central banks even more power to manipulate currency by making it digital is crazy. Read “A History of Central Banking and the Enslavement of Mankind”. A CBDC is a TERRIBLE idea and Trump was absolutely right in rejecting it.
As the author points out cryptocurencies and stablecoins already exist as digital currencies. And they are actually very easy to use, people just need to educate themselves.
@no thanks
Only in Dominica people are not reaping the huge benefits of crypto currency especially bitcoin.
This country is really last in everything.