Nine out of 10 central banks are exploring central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), andmore than half are now developing them or running concrete experiments. In particular,work on retail CBDCs has moved to more advanced stages. Both Covid-19 and theemergence of stablecoins and other cryptocurrencies have accelerated the work onCBDCs – especially in advanced economies, where central banks say that financialstability has increased in importance as a motivation for their CBDC involvement.Globally, more than two thirds of central banks consider that they are likely to or mightpossibly issue a retail CBDC in either the short or medium term. Work on wholesaleCBDCs is increasingly driven by reasons related to cross-border payments efficiency.Central banks consider CBDCs as capable of alleviating key pain points such as thelimited operating hours of current payment systems and the length of current