The UAE represented by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Vice President, Deputy Prime Minister, Chairman of the Presidential Court, and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE), executed the first ever cross border payment using central bank digital currency (CBDC), utilizing the MBridge or Jisr network, developed by BIS for cross border payments, with China.
The execution of the payment was done in the presence of Pan Gongsheng, Governor of the People’s Bank of China, at Qasr Al Watan in Abu Dhabi, in the presence of Khaled Mohamed Balama, Governor of the Central Bank of the UAE.
The “Jisr” platform or better known as MBridge, for central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), was established by BIS with the participation of a group of UAE and Chinese banks. It aims to facilitate cross-border payments, significantly reduce transaction costs, and provide instant payment settlement.
As per the announcement, the platform is expected to undergo further expansion in 2026, with the addition of more central banks.
UAE’s first digital dirham CBDC transaction between governmental entities
Saudi Arabia had joined the cross-border CBDC project known as MBridge. In 2024, in an IMF blog, it noted that almost two-thirds of countries in the Middle East and Central Asia are exploring the adoption of a central bank digital currency, with Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the UAE in the more advanced proof of concept stages.
IMF has noted that the countries in MENA and Central Asia are studying CBDCs as a way to promote financial inclusion and improve the efficiency of cross-border payments.
This recent cross-border payment between the UAE and China comes as the UAE prepares to launch its CBDC, the digital dirham, with a piloted settlement already taking place between two governmental entities. The settlement was carried out between the Ministry of Finance (MoF) and the Dubai Department of Finance (DOF), in collaboration with the Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE), and was completed in less than two minutes.