Marc JonesJohn Revill 4 minute read The technology means payments will be almost instant while both central banks effectively have to digitally approve them before they can go through. "In order for CBDCs to be real they need to be able to be used across borders and in a way that preserves sovereignty," said Todd McDonald, co-founder of the R3 firm behind the technology. ESSENTIAL The central banks said the project was "exploratory" and was not an indication that their digital currencies would be fully introduced. The scheme, which will run for the next few months, is also the latest part of the Project Helvetia experiment launched in Switzerland last year into using tokenised assets with wholesale CBDC. It comes, too, after the central banks of China and United Arab Emirates joined a cross-border digital currency project called Multiple CBDC dubbed m-bridge in partnership"s with the BIS" innovation arm based in Hong Kong. SNB governing board member Andrea Maechler said her bank was taking part because "it is essential for central banks to stay on top of technological developments." Wholesale digital currencies, usually limited to financial institutions which hold accounts with a central bank, are different from retail CBDCs which are available to the general public. They are seen as the most popular proposal among central banks because of the potential to make existing wholesale financial systems faster, cheaper and safer. The SNB has been skeptical about digital currencies like Facebook"s Diem project, formerly known as Libra, saying they could undermine its ability to conduct monetary policy.