As I said earlier, the government has initiated a study to look at digital currencies, in general, and to look at how their increasing popularity is affecting the economy and financial stability. One of the things that we've been studying for a number of years is whether or not we need a national digital currency, a central bank digital currency. As I said earlier, there are many underlying benefits to the innovations in digital currencies. They may hold potential to bring more efficiency to payments, and more competition to the financial sector.
It's really worth studying. The central banks have been doing that for quite a long time now. We have actually moved from a research stage into an early development stage.
Ultimately, whether or not Canada will have a central bank digital currency is a decision that Parliament will make. It's not one that the Bank of Canada will make. We view our job as to be ready, to have done the work ahead of time, so that if we decide that a central bank digital currency is something that would benefit Canadians, we're ready to provide it.