Starbucks and McDonald’s should not test the Profit Revolution of China after all, as it is reported.
The American fast-food giants, such as Starbucks and McDonald’s, are not supposed to participate in the ongoing tests for the digital yuan in China
According to a report by the news agency Sina Finance on October 14, the digital currency of the Chinese central bank (CBDC) is still being tested on a „small scale“, especially in retail and in the hospitality sector.
A number of overseas merchants believed to be participating in China’s CBDC tests have not yet used the digital yuan as a means of payment.
In Xiong’an, one of the major Chinese cities testing the digital yuan , 19 companies are said to have participated in their CBDC pilot project. These included Starbucks, McDonald’s, Subway and UnionPay’s cloud project Unmanned Automated Supermarket.
However, according to Sina Finance, none of these companies has yet participated in the digital yuan tests and only accepts digital payments via WeChat, Alipay and QuickPass
None of the companies made official statements regarding tests for the digital yuan. Cointelegraph approached Starbucks and McDonald’s for comment, but received no response by press time.
The Chinese authorities launched the first digital yuan tests in April 2020 . On October 5, China’s central bank announced that the currency-linked wallets had processed $ 162 million in transactions between April and August 2020 . To promote the currency, the central bank held a $ 1.5 million lottery . 2 million people are said to have participated in the lottery at 3,000 participating dealers.