As the commencement of the 2022 Winter Olympics on February 4 in Beijing draws nearer, China’s top monetary authorities are preparing to stage the most high-profile test yet for digital yuan , the official electronic form of the country’s currency, within the event’s closed-loop anti-covid bubble. The pilot program for the digital yuan, or e-CNY, will represent a key development in ongoing efforts by the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) to promote the further internationalization of the yuan, while countries around the world explore ways to bring about their own central bank digital currency (CBDC). “The PBOC has long planned…