The Bank of China, a state-owned bank in China, is expected to conduct trials for an offline payment system which will be connected to SIM cards. It is expected that this payment method is designed for the digital yuan, China’s central bank-backed digital currency (CBDC), stated Cointelegraph.
Sources revealed that on July 10, 2023, an announcement was made about the bank’s partnership with China Telecom and China Unicom, which are telecommunication operators. This was expected to commence testing the next day, Cointelegraph added.
According to Cointelegraph, Bank of China plans to enable users to make phone payments by using a digital yuan app having “super SIM cards” with near-field communication capabilities. Supposedly, the users need to bring their mobile phones near the point of sale terminals for payment.
It is expected that this can allow transactions to be processed even when the phone is powered off. Furthermore, the bank stated that these SIM card payment functions will only be accessible on specific Android phones in a few test regions of China, Cointelegraph concluded.
(With insights from Cointelegraph)
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