China to hand out over $6 MILLION in another digital yuan lottery

The Beijing Local Financial Supervision and Administration Bureau has officially announced that some 40 million digital yuan ($6.2 million) will be distributed to the city’s residents as part of a new digital currency trial.

Starting this month, a total of 200,000 digital red envelopes, each containing 200 digital yuan ($31), will be given to lottery winners in the digital renminbi test program, said the bureau. Red envelopes are a traditional way of gifting money in China.

Beijing residents can sign up for the lottery through the mobile applications of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), as well as the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, until midnight on June 7. The winners will be able to spend their prizes by June 20.

The Chinese government has already carried out multiple e-yuan giveaways as part of its digital currency tests and plans to expand the pilot program in the future.

Last year, the PBOC revealed plans to have its sovereign digital currency ready in time for the 2022 Winter Olympics. It said that the new currency, which doesn’t have an official name but is known by its internal shorthand DCEP – or Digital Currency Electronic Payment – will share some features with cryptocurrencies. The e-yuan is projected to replace cash in circulation, while China plans to become the first major economy to test a digital currency on a national level.

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