«——【Preamble】】 ——»
In life, what kind of payment method will you choose, WeChat, Alipay, cash or digital yuan, I think for most people, the answer is WeChat or Alipay, and for older people, it is cash, and as for digital yuan, there are very few people who use it in life.
As a new payment method released by the People's Bank of China in 2019, it was piloted in 26 cities in the early stage, and when the digital yuan appeared, some experts even said that in the coming years, the digital yuan has the ability to challenge the dominance of WeChat and Alipay at the payment tool level.
The reason for this prediction is that the digital yuan has certain advantages over WeChat and Alipay in terms of payment, not only supporting offline payment, but also not charging fees when transferring money.
Although the digital yuan has been implemented for more than four years, it has not been able to dominate people's payment methods in practical applications, but has gradually faded out of the public eye.
So why has the digital yuan fallen to the point where no one cares about it today?
«——【The Birth of the Digital Yuan·】——»
The mainland's monetary system has undergone several in-depth reforms to adapt to sustainable economic and social development. With the deepening of reform, the cash RMB has gradually established a core position in people's daily life. The fundamental reason for this is that cash is intuitive and easy to use compared to other payment methods. In an emergency, cash can quickly play its role as a medium of exchange, providing convenience and security for the public.
In recent years, rapid advances in technology have revolutionized the payment sector. As a new type of payment, mobile payment has been quietly integrated into people's daily life. Especially with the wide application of payment platforms such as WeChat and Alipay, mobile payment has gradually replaced cash and has become the mainstream payment method for the people.
However, just when mobile payment was popular, the country launched a digital yuan payment method in 2019, and the reason why the word "number" was added in front of the yuan was to distinguish it from the cash yuan in people's hands.
After all, the digital yuan is different from cash, cash can be seen and touched, and the digital people can also be seen but touched, because this is an electronic yuan, and if you want to say that the two are similar, that is, the value of the two is equal.
After the country launched the digital yuan, it also used 26 cities as pilots for experiments.
The main reason why the country launched the RMB is that under the premise that China's economy is shifting from high-speed development to high-quality development, in order to accelerate the diversified development of the digital economy.
As for the digital yuan, it also has many advantages, one of which is that it is a legal tender like the cash yuan and has the basic function as a currency.
In addition, the payment mechanism of the e-CNY has significantly improved convenience and cost-effectiveness. First of all, its real-time arrival not only optimizes the efficiency of capital utilization, but also strengthens the transmission mechanism of monetary policy. Second, from a cost perspective, the issuance cost of the digital yuan is much lower than that of current banknotes and coins, bringing substantial savings to the economic system.
In addition to the above advantages, the digital yuan also supports offline payment, so that in the event of a disaster, the digital yuan can be used normally like paper money without being interfered with by the signal.
It is precisely because of the many advantages of the digital yuan that many experts believe that in the next few years, the digital yuan will replace WeChat and Alipay as the mainstream payment method.
However, the actual implementation is different from what was expected, and it has been more than 4 years since the implementation of the digital yuan, not only has it not made many waves, but the existence of the digital yuan is gradually decreasing, why does this happen.
«——【Why can't the digital yuan be popularized·】——»
Before the advent of the digital yuan, cash was the main payment method in the early days of human society. However, with the rapid development of technology and the rapid development of the Internet, mobile payment has gradually emerged and become an indispensable part of people's lives.
Since the advent of mobile payment, it has become people's mainstream payment work in a short practical case, and the reason why this is the case is because mobile payment is more convenient than cash, and you don't have to worry about receiving counterfeit money.
In today's market, WeChat and Alipay can be said to be the most mainstream payment tools for people, although there are other payment tools during this period, but it is still these two who firmly occupy the payment market.
The reason why the digital yuan cannot become the main choice for people is because, compared with the digital yuan, people have become accustomed to using WeChat and Alipay.
And compared with the digital yuan, WeChat and Alipay have expanded many other businesses, for example, on WeChat, we can make calls, shopping and other behaviors, while on Alipay, we can manage money. It can be said that WeChat and Alipay completely incorporate people's daily life into it, and truly survive without leaving home.
As for the digital yuan, in addition to being able to be used for transactions, other functions have not yet been realized, which is not suitable for people who have become accustomed to convenient life.
In addition to people's payment habits, the reason why the digital yuan cannot prosper is that its application scenarios are too few compared to WeChat and Alipay, and many places, especially small merchants and hawkers, have no way to achieve the popularization of the digital yuan, on the other hand, WeChat and Alipay are not subject to this restriction, as long as they put their own collection code there to complete the payment.
In addition to the above reasons, the third is time, after all, the digital yuan has only been launched for more than 4 years, unlike WeChat and Alipay, which have existed for many years and have adapted well to people's living habits.
«——【Prospect of the Digital Yuan·】——»
Although the digital yuan is not very suitable for people's lives at present, its development prospects are still very broad, after all, the emergence of a new technology is constantly adapting to society.
While adapting, it also needs to be continuously promoted, and it is not enough to be conservative to adapt to society, you must know that when the digital yuan has just come out, its promotion efforts can be described as unprecedented, which also gives many people a vote of confidence in its prospects. However, the market has gradually weakened the voice of the digital yuan, and if it is to enhance its competitiveness, it needs to increase publicity efforts to educate the public about its advantages and value in a broader and deeper way.
And at the same time as publicity, it is necessary to increase research and development efforts and launch some features that people love.
Looking forward to the future, the digital yuan will undoubtedly have broader development prospects, and its convenience and security will make it a leader in the field of mobile payment, favored by the majority of users. It is unlikely that it will completely replace WeChat and Alipay, and the biggest possibility is that it will form a three-legged situation.
Information sources:
[1] The Paper - "The digital yuan has been promoted for four years, why are so few people using it?" (2023-09-12)
[2] Not Obsessed with Finance - "It's Been 4 Years Since the Promotion of Digital Yuan, Why Are There Still Few People Who Use It?5 Major Problems to Be Solved" (2023-05-02)
[3] Encyclopedia Password-"Can Digital Yuan "Kill" WeChat Alipay? It Has Been Promoted for Four Years, Why Is It Still Tepid(2023-09-28)