Rabat — Morocco’s central bank has completed its first digital currency experiment focused on peer-to-peer retail payments and now moves forward with cross-border payment trials.
Bank Al-Maghrib (BAM) Governor Abdellatif Jouahri announced the news on Monday, adding, “We are conducting another experiment in collaboration with the Central Bank of Egypt and with support from the World Bank on cross-border transfer use cases.”
BAM’s governor made the announcement during the opening of the 2025 continental seminar of the Association of African Central Banks (ABCA), which runs from July 21-23 in Rabat under the theme “Cyber-risks and innovative financial technologies: challenges and strategic measures.”
Jouahri explained that Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), as sovereign money, can serve as a digital payment option for both wholesale and retail versions. The central bank will complete the project with studies and analyses on legal and regulatory aspects.
“Like other countries on the continent, we have conducted studies at Bank Al-Maghrib on issuing a Central Bank Digital Currency with support from the World Bank and IMF. These studies mainly focused on defining CBDC’s strategic objectives and its potential macroeconomic impacts on payment systems,” he said.
The BAM governor announced the completion of a draft law that establishes a legal framework for crypto asset usage. The legislation aims to protect consumers and investors appropriately while strengthening market integrity against fraud, manipulation, money laundering, and terrorism financing.
Jouahri touched upon the mandatory role of authorities, including central banks, to regulate crypto assets and stablecoins. According to the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), these instruments do not fulfill the attributes of public money.
“These instruments present risks of money laundering and excessive disintermediation that could compromise the integrity and resilience of the financial system,” he explained.
Morocco’s financial services digitalization has been driven by traditional banks adapting to ongoing transformations as well as payment institutions adopting agile business models and a developing fintech ecosystem, Jouahri noted.
The central bank recently created the Morocco FinTech Center through a public-private partnership. The platform supports and guides innovative project holders while strengthening a dynamic and inclusive digital ecosystem.
“We want our dialogue with fintechs to be constant to offer them a flexible regulatory framework adapted to their services’ specificities and to encourage collaboration between established players and new entrants,” Jouahri stressed.
