China is at the forefront of developing central bank digital currency (CBDC), starting to test it as early as 2020. Today, the country enabled smart contract functionality for its CBDC, the digital yuan. This new feature is launched through the Meituan app and includes new use cases.
Launched smart contract function via Meituan
China’s central bank’s digital currency upgrade, e-CNY, has enabled smart contract functionality. The latter was launched on e-commerce app Meituan, local crypto outlet 8btc reports, on January 17. It is one of China’s largest food delivery and lifestyle apps.
A smart contract fires and searches for keywords when users of Meituan place an order and pay with their e-CNY wallet. If a user purchases an item that is on the Today’s Keywords list, they are entered into the raffle to win a portion of a prize. The price is a share of the “hongbao”, a small red envelope containing 8,888 yuan, or approximately 1300 dollars. The e-CNY wallet allows users to send digital hongbao. This is to encourage the adoption of this method before the Chinese New Year on January 22.
New use cases for e-CNY
In addition, the upgrade also provides new uses for the digital yuan. According to a China Securities Journal report on Jan. 16, investors used e-CNY to purchase securities for the first time. Which is possible through the mobile app of Soochow Securities, a local brokerage firm. Users can also make contactless payments using Android phones.
The new features of the digital yuan come as the currency struggles to gain adoption. According to a former People’s Bank of China (PBOC) official, the use of the digital yuan has been low and very inactive. This bank revealed on January 10 that the CBDC represented only about 0.13% of the 10.47 trillion yuan in circulation at the end of 2022.
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