Digital Euro Unlikely To Launch Before 2029, ECB Board Member Says

Authored by Helen Partz via CoinTelegraph.com,

The digital euro, the European Union’s long-planned central bank digital currency (CBDC) project, is facing delays, with its launch now expected around mid-2029.

The EU’s digital euro could become a reality in 2029, European Central Bank Executive Board member Piero Cipollone said in a Bloomberg Future of Finance event Tuesday in Frankfurt.

“The middle of 2029 could be a fair assessment,” he said, adding that the ECB has been actively discussing the project at the level of EU member states.

If correct, Cipollone’s timeline would signal another delay for the digital euro, despite widespread calls to launch the CBDC to protect Europe’s financial sovereignty amid the US stablecoin push.

European Parliament is holding up progress

According to Cipollone, the European Parliament has been the biggest obstacle to progress toward a digital euro, as it must pass legislation to move forward with the project.

“We should arrive at a general approach, as they call it, an agreement among member-states by the end of the year,” he said, adding that the Parliament is likely to have a position on a digital euro by May 2026.

ECB Executive Board member Piero Cipollone in Frankfurt on Tuesday. Source: Bloomberg

Cipollone’s assessment on Europe’s CBDC launch came soon after EU ministers reached a “compromise” on the digital euro roadmap last week, imposing holding limits on the potential digital currency.

“The compromise that we reached is that before the ECB makes a final decision in relation to issuance [...] there would be an opportunity for a discussion in the Council of Ministers,” Irish Finance Minister and Eurogroup President Paschal Donohoe said at a news conference last Friday.

A MEP to report on progress on Oct. 24

While Cipollone expects the digital euro won’t launch before mid-2029, European authorities are pressing ahead with CBDC preparations, with the ECB targeting October to decide whether to move to the next phase.

A spokesperson for the ECB told Cointelegraph on Wednesday that a member of the European Parliament (MEP) is expected to deliver a progress report on the digital euro on Oct. 24.

Following the report, lawmakers will have six weeks to put forward amendments and a further five months for discussions, Cipollone reportedly said.

The digital euro: Five years in the making

Officially introduced by the ECB in October 2020, the digital euro project has emerged as one of Europe’s longest-discussed financial initiatives.

In June 2023, the European Commission published a legal proposal for a potential digital euro, yet progress within the European Parliament has remained limited.

Meanwhile, the ECB has steadily advanced the project, completing its investigation phase in November 2023 and moving into a preparation phase set to finish by October 2025.

Despite these steps, the initiative has faced significant skepticism from banks, lawmakers, member states, as well as end users, largely due to concerns around CBDC privacy.

Globally, some central banks have piloted their own digital currencies for years. China, for example, launched a pilot digital yuan wallet in early 2022. However, the digital yuan has encountered slow adoption, with critics describing many CBDCs as costly fiat replicas rather than genuine fintech innovations.