E-commerce giant Amazon said that the controversial digital euro would add value and increase innovation. But Amazon may be somewhat biased since the European Central Bank (ECB) tasked Amazon with building a digital euro prototype for application in e-commerce.
The ECB has been exploring a digital euro for a while, which it claims is supposed to be a stable alternative to money and make the central bank remain relevant in the digital era. The move would grant more central control of all spending.
Last year, the ECB tasked several private companies with building prototypes for different applications. Amazon was selected to build a prototype for e-commerce payments.
In a report about the findings of and lessons learned from the exercise, the ECB said: “The tests showed that it is possible to smoothly integrate them while leaving ample scope for innovative features and technologies. The findings also confirmed that a digital euro could in principle work both online and offline, using independent designs.”
“Our aim in the exercise was to successfully deliver a front-end prototype of an e-commerce transaction and integrate it with the Eurosystem’s back-end infrastructure prototype, thus confirming that a potential digital euro could be smoothly integrated into the existing European payments landscape,” Amazon said.
The company continued to say that it welcomes the idea of a digital euro.
“We at Amazon believe a digital euro can be a tool to foster innovation and increase the efficiency of payments,” the company said, adding that the digital euro would deliver “significant benefits” to consumers, merchants, and the economy.
