On Monday, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) released an official white paper exploring the potential of a retail-focused central bank digital currency (CBDC), the digital Hong Kong dollar (e-HKD). According to the document, the HKMA will seek to understand the “potential architectures and design options” from a technical and regulatory policy perspective, with the ambition of creating a dual-tier system — the first being designed for a “central bank to issue and redeem CBDC,” and the second being retail-centric for “commercial banks to distribute and circulate either rCBDC or CBDC-backed e-money.” Hong Kong debuted its investigation into CBDCs in 2017 with Project LionRock, and in early 2020, it embarked on a seven-month collaboration with the Bank of Thailand, prospecting the “potential of wholesale CBDC for cross-border payments.”