The paper provides an overview of the development of digital money and payment systems in Pacific Island Countries, assessing potential benefits and risks, with a focus on how they can harness digital technology to enhance financial inclusion and payment efficiency while minimizing risks. 

This paper provides an overview of the nature, pros, and cons of cryptoassets and central bank digital currencies, documents their recent experience in Latin America and the
Caribbean, and presents some general lessons and policy recommendations for the region.

The purpose of the paper is not to evaluate the courses taken by different jurisdictions, but to study and discuss their key experiences and lessons.

The paper:

• explores the policy goals of the different jurisdictions; 
• reviews the operational models for CBDC, that is, who issues and distributes CBDC and the respective roles of the central bank and the private sector; 
• looks at the design features of CBDC, which range from ways to mitigate risks to uses in cross-border payments;
• considers options available to jurisdictions on specific  technologies and moves to the legal foundations of CBDC; 
• examines the process of exploring and testing CBDC, such as organisational choices and staffing. It also includes insights identified as particularly important by the jurisdictions themselves on the way forward.

IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva, in her speech 'The Future of Money: Gearing up for Central Bank Digital Currency', given at Atlantic Council, Washington, DC, said there are three common lessons from the experiences of the central banks from which others might benefit:

1. No one size fits all - central banks should tailor plans to their specific circumstances and needs.
2. Financial stability and privacy considerations are paramount to the design of CBDCs.
3. Balance - introducing a CBDC is about finding the "delicate balance" between developments on the design front and on the policy front.

The purpose of Fintech note 1 is to assist countries in their understanding and mitigation of the money laundering (ML), terror financing (TF), and financing of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (PF) risks related to virtual assets (VAs).

This note is broad in scope. It explains why VAs are vulnerable for misuse for ML/TF/PF purposes and clarifies which assets and service providers should be subject to AML/CFT measures. It discusses the measures that all countries should take, and the type of action necessary in instances of criminal misuse of VA.

The purpose of this Fintech note 2 is to discuss the necessary anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism measures and provide examples of practical solutions to implement them.