( February 21, 2023, 1:31 PM EST) -- The Federal Reserve is on track to launch its new instant payments service between May and July 2023. The service is called FedNow. The creation of a Central Bank Currency (CBDC) is being promoted by the Federal Reserve as the "next step" toward modernization after implementation of the FedNow Service. President Biden has signed an executive order for federal agencies to more urgently explore plans to implement a CBDC in the U.S. The Wall Street Journal reports the global status as follows: "One hundred and fourteen countries are exploring digital currencies, and their collective economies represent more than 95% of the world’s GDP.... Some countries, including China, India, Nigeria and the Bahamas, have already rolled out digital currencies. Others, like Sweden and Japan, are preparing for possible rollouts. The U.S. is studying the issue and has run trials of various technologies to enable a digital currency, although Fed chair Jerome Powell has indicated the U.S. central bank has no plans to create one, and won't do so without direction from Congress." Originally published in the July 2021 edition of this newsletter, this story on what a digitized U.S. dollar would look like continues to be timely....