Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Chairwoman of the House Committee on Financial Services, gave the following statement at the Task Force for Financial Technology virtual hearing entitled, “Digitizing the Dollar: Investigating the Technological Infrastructure, Privacy, and Financial Inclusion Implications of Central Bank Digital Currencies.” 

Thank you very much, Chair Lynch.

Today’s hearing begins a series of hearings for the Committee on an especially important topic: cryptocurrencies and other digital assets. As cryptocurrencies grow exponentially, I’ve organized a working group of Democratic members to engage with regulators and experts to do a deep dive on this poorly understood and minimally regulated industry. 

Today, we continue this discussion by considering central bank digital currencies, or CBDCs, which are being created by governments around the world, and which the Federal Reserve is actively reviewing. If properly designed, CBDCs have the potential to harness the positive innovations arising from cryptocurrencies and to digitize our dollar.  

So, I look forward to this discussion and yield back the balance of my time. 

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