The introduction of digital central bank money should therefore be carefully considered. Incidentally, I am quite sure that a need for crypto tokens in general, and digital central bank money in particular, will not arise in the first place if we at the central bank ensure that the technology behind payment transactions is always up to date.
-4Chart 1: The Bank of Canada’s balance sheet remains relatively low Central bank total assets as a percentage of a four-quarter average of Gross Domestic Product, quarterly data %  %  150  80  60 100 40 50 20  0 2007  0 2010  2013  Bank of Japan (left scale) US Federal Reserve (right scale) Bank of England (right scale)  2016  2019  Bank of Canada (right scale) European Central Bank (right scale) Reserve Bank of Australia (right scale)  Sources: Bank of Canada, Bloomberg Finance L.P., national sources via Haver Analytics and Bank of Canada calculations Last observation: 2020Q3  Of course, when we buy these bonds through our auction, we need to pay for them.