In a keynote speech, South African Reserve Bank Deputy Governor Rashad Cassim restated the Bank's view that there is no compelling need for immediate implementation of a retail central bank digital currency and said the policy priority is to modernise South Africa's retail payments system. He set out a hybrid model in which the Bank and the private sector jointly shape the payments landscape, with Payments Ecosystem Modernisation shifting the Bank from policy setting alone to more active coordination of infrastructure upgrades and regulatory changes aimed at faster, cheaper and safer low-value payments and wider access for non-bank entrants. South Africa is strong in wholesale payments, where SAMOS processes about R584 billion a day and settles transactions above R5 million individually and irrevocably in real time, but retail payments have lagged peers such as Brazil and India, prompting work with industry on PayShap and broader reforms. Project Khokha experiments showed distributed ledger technology can support tokenised central bank money, securities and settlement in controlled settings, but exposed privacy, interoperability, governance and legal finality issues. On stablecoins, the Bank said domestic activity is still mainly tied to crypto trading, arbitrage and settlement rather than everyday payments, and it is assessing whether existing regulation can be extended or whether a separate framework is needed given risks to monetary integrity, currency substitution and exchange control circumvention.
South African Reserve Bank2026-06-09
South African Reserve Bank restates no immediate retail CBDC case and sets out payments modernisation agenda
The South African Reserve Bank reiterated it sees no immediate need for a retail central bank digital currency and is prioritising modernisation of the retail payments system through a hybrid public‑private model and more active coordination of infrastructure and regulatory changes. Deputy Governor Rashad Cassim highlighted progress and gaps in wholesale and retail payments, findings from Project Khokha on distributed ledger technology, and assessment of whether to extend existing rules or create a separate framework for stablecoins given associated risks.