Mastercard has demonstrated a technology that enables CBDCs to be tokenised, or “wrapped”, onto different blockchains.

The payment processor’s demonstration came as part of its participation in the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre’s (DFCRC) CBDC pilot project which has been exploring potential use cases for a CBDC in Australia.

Mastercard’s test demonstrated how its technology could enable the holder of a pilot CBDC to purchase a NFT listed on the Ethereum public blockchain.

The process “locked” the required amount of a pilot CBDC on the RBA’s pilot CBDC platform and minted an equivalent amount of pilot CBDC tokens on Ethereum.

A proviso of the test transaction was that the Ethereum wallets of the buyer, seller, and the NFT marketplace smart contract, were ‘allow-listed’ within the platform.

With all other transfers that the wrapped pilot CBDC blocked, it successfully demonstrated the platform’s ability to implement controls – even on public blockchains.

“As the digital economy continues to mature, Mastercard has seen demand from consumers to participate in commerce across multiple blockchains, including public blockchains,” said Richard Wormald, division president, Australasia at Mastercard. “This technology not only has the potential to drive more consumer choice, but it also unlocks new opportunities for collaboration between the public and private networks to drive genuine impact in the digital currency space.”

Mastercard launched a CBDC partner programme in August for leading blockchain technology and payment service providers.

Head of digital assets and blockchain at Mastercard Raj Dhamodharan said at the time the move was designed to “foster collaboration with key players in the space so they can drive innovation and efficiencies”.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and the central banks of France, Singapore, and Switzerland also recently concluded a successful test around cross-border wholesale CBDCs.

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