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The Digital Euro Is Here | Why They Want to Control Your Money | Beyond Bitcoin · Simply Bitcoin

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  Central bank digital currencies are coming.
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  They're marketed as safer, faster, more private.
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  But look at the timing. Europe's debt is rising,
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  deficits are stubborn and markets are nervous.
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  When capital starts looking for an exit, a programmable,
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  centrally issued currency becomes the lever.
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  Imagine a digital single payment solution that could be used for
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  any kind of payment throughout the euro area.
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  Guess what? It could become a reality.
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  A digital euro Easy, safe, fast, reliable digital money from the
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  European Central Bank at your fingertips whenever you need it.
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  PC BS, digital Euro, Fast, reliable, sexy, Orwellian and
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  though they may spin it for convenience but it's probably
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  more for control. In Q1 of 2025, the euro area's
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  public debt sat near 88% of GDP, with several countries far
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  higher. And that's the backdrop.
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  So maybe ask yourself, are CBD CS is truly about consumer
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  safety or capital control? And if that's the direction, why
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  does Bitcoin open borderless, unsensible suddenly matter more
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  than ever? Well, that answer is pretty
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  obvious. But imotions, this is beyond
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  Bitcoin. Let's dive in.
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  Let me move on to digital assets because of course the ECB and
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  your colleagues in Europe will be dictating or or overseeing
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  changes in crypto, changes in digital assets and the digital
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  euro. What would you like to see?
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  I'd like to say that we started that process a few years back.
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  We are moving on very practically because we are not
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  really at the sort of pre pilot stage experimenting with
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  different types of technologies and we should be ready to launch
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  in about 18 months that's. Very exciting.
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  How will this change people's lives?
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  You know, it's, it's people who have dictated that change
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  because in the many, many countries now in European, in
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  the European Union, you see that customers do clients, citizens,
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  whatever the age, they are prepared not to use digital
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  currencies. So the digital euro for me is
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  like digital cash. Instead of getting they, they,
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  you know, banknotes from the ATM machine, they'll be able to use
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  cash, but in a digital form, whether they use it with their
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  phone or other devices. But that's exactly the
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  equivalent of, of cash, but in a digital form.
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  And it's to help them, you know, pay in the way they want and
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  transact in the way they want. It's more opportunities for
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  them. Officials promise a Privacy by
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  Design digital euro that's supposed to actually release in
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  this coming October, and they're saying the ECB would not be able
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  to identify who you are or what you're buying.
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  They're also saying that their privacy features are the highest
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  of any electronic payment. That's their pitch.
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  But in this case, context matters.
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  The euro areas debt ratio has been edging up again.
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  The highly indebted members, Greece at 152% of debt to GDP,
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  Italy at 138%, France at 114% are already beyond old
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  Maastricht comfort levels. And look up what Maastricht is,
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  that might be important. As you know that Maastricht is a
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  place, a city and a municipality in the southern Netherlands.
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  Man, being American, you don't know anything, do you?
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  There's so many places you've never heard of, like Maastricht.
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  France's own budget minister warned in June that failure to
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  rein in the deficit could invite IMF, EU oversight.
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  At today's press conference, Francois Baillard warned that
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  France was facing an immediate danger of falling into over a
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  very indebtedness. That's when a nation owes more
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  than it can repay. He said that the debt servicing
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  cost will become the largest expenditure this year,
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  surpassing that of education or that of defence.
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  Let's take a listen to him. LA France, no Papa in your
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  recent orgy. France cannot ignore this
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  danger. It cannot stand idly by.
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  It is heading for disaster if it does not take the courageous but
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  still possible and bearable decisions that are necessary and
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  that we are debating. And this shows when finance is
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  tightened, governments hunt for control points.
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  Capital controls aren't theory. In Cyprus in 2013, large
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  payments required central bank approval.
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  The banking crisis engulfing Cyprus came down to brutally
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  simple terms. Today, for ordinary depositors,
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  €100 per day is all that can be withdrawn from most bank ATMs.
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  Anything to prevent a run on the banks that have already been
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  closed for a week. They don't have access to their
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  money. They do not know what tomorrow
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  will bring. Tomorrow is the deadline for a
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  $13 billion bailout. To stave off national
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  bankruptcy. The president of Cyprus flew to
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  Brussels today. But to get those billions,
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  Cyprus may have to slap a 20% tax on some bank deposits over
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  €100,000. Outgoing transfers over
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  thresholds were blocked or pre cleared.
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  These are explicit tools to stop money from leaving the country.
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  In Greece in 2015, withdrawals, cash exports and foreign
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  transfers were all capped for years before being lifted in
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  2018. Now pair that history with a
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  programmable currency, ACBDC. The IMF's own taxonomy defines
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  capital flow management measures as rules designed to limit
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  inflows and outflows, and that's exactly the kind of fine grain
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  control that a CBDC enables. Holding limits?
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  Geofencing, Time based rules and real time monitoring.
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  Now all these things are absolutely ludicrous to think
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  about our cash society right now.
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  Now, if you think about what geofencing is where you can't
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  spend outside of your geographical area or time based
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  rules where your money expires. This already exists in China
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  with their digital yuan and all of these things come under the
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  banner of stability. Just want stability.
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  In my. Life, Charlie.
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  Keep it stable, you know, Keep the money controlled.
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  Keep the population controlled. This isn't about tinfoil hats.
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  It's about incentives. When debt and deficits squeeze
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  states, capital flight is the enemy.
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  Fight the capital flight. I'm doing my part.
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  I'm doing my part. Do your.
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  Part fight the capital flight. CBD CS give the state a software
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  switchboard like into an app that you can control the the
• 6:28
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• 6:49
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  With all of these attributes of CBDCS, Bitcoin becomes the anti
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  architecture of that system. It's decentralized, the issuance
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  and validation. There's no single shut off
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  switch. It's permissionless.
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  Anyone with an Internet connection can participate.
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  Bitcoin allows you to self custody your private keys.
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  There's no custodian to freeze your assets and borderless
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  settlement which doesn't recognize borders.
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  Obviously in a world of software defined money, Bitcoin is free
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  speech money. If CBDC's become the default
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  rails with baked in limits, Bitcoin is the parallel rails
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  that stay open all the time. As you mentioned, market stress
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  is already visible. Frances deteriorating fiscal
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  position has pushed investors to price it closer to the euro
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  periphery. Analysts see deficits and
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  politics colliding with higher borrowing costs.
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  Now they're trying to sell CBD CS as modernization, as in we're
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  being innovative, we need to innovate with the rest of the
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  world. But what's really going on is
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  capital is leaving, so they need to be able to control that.
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  What do you want to say to critics who say a digital euro
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  risks surveillance? It it it risks becoming a tool
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  of financial surveillance and central control.
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  Not true. Why not?
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  Because we are looking at a technology that will actually
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  protect the privacy. And I think that in peer-to-peer
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  payment, this is all already a given.
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  And for larger payments where, for instance, AML anti money
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  laundering rules will have to apply because we don't want to
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  support, you know, hanky panky business of, of a dark nature.
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  Then the rules of scrutiny will be applied by the banks, which
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  already have access to the, the, the, the transactions and the,
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  the payments that are made by their clients.
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  There's, there's not going to be more than that.
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  And, and we are not interested in the data.
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  I mean, the private sector is interested in data.
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  The banks are interested in data and they can monetize that, but
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  we have no interest and we couldn't do it.
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  It's not, it's not in our business.
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  So. So you can reassure people that
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  a central bank digital euro will not undermine people's freedoms.
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  Correct. It will give them additional
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  freedom actually. The policy lovers that come
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  bundled with these CBDC's, especially in a crisis, look a
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  lot like capital controls with better UX.
• 9:11
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• 9:41
  So we need to learn the rails. We need to run a wallet that we
• 9:45
  control. We need to practice secure
• 9:47
  backups, and we need to consider running a node.
• 9:49
  Are you running a node? Yeah, sure.
• 9:51
  I'm. I'm running a node.
• 9:52
  Yeah, I got all. I got all kinds of nodes.
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  What? What nodes do you need?
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  I got AI, got a fresh node. I got a watermelon node.
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  We need to be able to track the law, ask pointed questions about
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  holding limits, offline caps and data access, and we need to know
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  our history on the subject. Cyprus in 2013, Greece in 2015.
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  Europe has a history of capital controls and a CBDC makes them
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  frictionless. Remember that CBDC's can be
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  pitched as innovations or instruments, tools to help you
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  out. But in a debt crisis, incentives
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  tilt towards control and Bitcoin remains the opt in alternative
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  open rails when the mainline gates close.
• 10:29
  It's better to study Bitcoin while the choice is still yours.
• 10:32
  Thank you so much for watching this video.
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  If you like what you see and you want to see more, make sure you
• 10:35
  hit that like button below. You can leave us a comment, even
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  subscribe to the Simply Bitcoin channel for more content like
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  this. We're coming out with it every
• 10:43
  single day. Also, don't forget to hit that
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  notification bell imotions. This is beyond Bitcoin.
• 10:49
  Until next time.