The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas and participating financial institutions have successfully completed testing for Project Agila, a pioneering initiative that will enable fund transfers between financial institutions even outside business hours, including evenings, weekends, and holidays.
This new capability, supported by open-source distributed ledger technology via Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, marks a significant step toward modernizing the Philippines’ financial ecosystem.
Project Agila serves as a proof-of-concept for the BSP’s Central Bank Digital Currency at the wholesale level. The testing covered various aspects, including functionality, performance, security, and end-to-end programmability, to assess the feasibility of integrating CBDCs into the country’s financial infrastructure.
BSP Governor Eli M. Remolona, Jr. noted the potential benefits of wholesale CBDCs, including enhanced liquidity management, reduced settlement risks, and increased financial stability. “The insights from this project will inform our CBDC roadmap, helping us leverage new technologies to strengthen the national payment system,” Remolona stated.
Wholesale CBDCs are digital currencies backed by the central bank and can be used by commercial banks for interbank payments, securities transactions, and cross-border payments. The project aims to explore the potential of CBDCs in improving the country’s large-value payment system and overall financial resilience.
