Digital RMB nail salons can also use the pilot to sink to the C end
Our reporter's trainee reporter Zhang Bolin and Pingying
More than 1.91 million applicants and 50,000 won the lottery. The winning rate of the digital RMB red envelope was 2.61%.
"I feel very lucky. After winning the lottery, I shared my joy on social platforms and went to some merchants that can support digital renminbi payment. It feels very good." After experiencing digital renminbi payment, Ms. Li told the "Securities" "The Daily" reporter introduced.
From October 8th to 18th, the news of Shenzhen's digital RMB red envelope pilot program immediately attracted widespread attention.
It is reported that this is the first large-scale test for the general public for the small retail scene.
The sinking of the scope of the pilot to C-end users means that the development of digital RMB has taken another solid step.
Paying for consumption only needs to "upgrade"
The digital RMB red envelopes issued this time have a denomination of 200 yuan and need to be used by 3389 merchants in Luohu District that have completed the digital RMB system transformation.
Participating merchants are mainly divided into four categories, one is shopping malls and supermarkets, the second is life services, the third is daily retail, and the fourth is catering consumption. There are rich consumption scenarios that can be experienced, mostly small retail scenarios.
Ms. Li told the "Securities Daily" reporter, "Wal-mart and China Resources Vanguard, which I often go to, support digital renminbi payment, and some pharmacies, restaurants, and hotels also support it. What surprised me more is that some nail salons can also be used. Use the remaining money, I want to make a manicure."
"There are still not enough merchants available for consumption." Another Mr. Ou, who won the lottery, introduced to a reporter from the Securities Daily. "I asked some merchant shop assistants. The shop assistant told me that the digital renminbi pilot has been implemented for some time, but I have never had it before. Noticed."
Later, Mr. Ou also showed the reporter the Digital RMB (beta) App.
The reporter found that compared with third-party payment software such as WeChat, the beta version of the App is very concise and focuses on offline payments. The operation logic of "upload payment, down payment" is simple and easy to use, and will not increase the user's learning cost. , More suitable for small retail scenarios.
But Mr. Ou also believes that for ordinary consumers, their experience is not significantly different from Alipay and WeChat. They all generate a QR code and then scan the code to pay.
Therefore, "I don't have strong motivation to change a payment platform. I hope that the digital RMB will have more new changes and new attempts in the future."
Ms. Li holds a different point of view. She believes that the App experience is very good, and that it is not bloated and no ads is her favorite. "If the digital RMB is officially launched in the future, I hope it will be so simple."
In addition, on October 15th, a reporter from Securities Daily visited a number of merchants in Luohu, Shenzhen, and learned that for shop assistants, users who use digital renminbi to pay by scanning codes are similarly different from third-party payment software. It's convenient and fast.
They also revealed that since the number of signatures in China is only 50,000, and they are scattered, not many users come to use digital renminbi for consumption.
"Touch" has not yet been opened
It is worth noting that although there is a "touch" in the Digital RMB (beta) App, this function has not yet been activated.
The merchants visited by the "Securities Daily" reporter said, "I have not been informed of this feature, and now they are all paying by scanning codes."
The "touch" function is "dual offline payment". At present, the offline payment of third-party payment software is "single offline", which is offline for users and online for merchants.
The "dual offline payment" can be achieved as long as two people have installed the central bank digital RMB App, without the need for network and signal, as long as the mobile phones have electricity, the two mobile phones can be touched to realize real-time transfers.
Chen Xiaohua, an expert in the evaluation of major industrial Internet blockchain projects of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and chairman of the China Mobile Communications Federation’s Blockchain Professional Committee, said in an interview with a reporter from the Securities Daily that the core of dual offline payment refers to the fact that both the media and the accepting terminal are offline. In this case, the most typical process of completing the business is to pay for the business and verify the identity.
For the payment business, it completes the closed-loop transaction process by deferring the payment after the transaction is completed. The core is a technical solution that achieves rapid verification and payment.
According to the patent "Transactions and Methods for Offline Payments Using Digital Currency Chip Cards" issued by the Central Bank Digital Currency Research Institute, the digital currency can rely on digital currency chip cards to realize dual offline payments.
Looking to the future, convenient, mature and secure technologies such as NFC are expected to play an important role in the dual offline payment of digital RMB.
Zheng Lei, director of the Digital Economy Research Center of the International Academy of New Economics, told a reporter from the Securities Daily that "dual offline payment" is very convenient and is a function that currently does not exist in mobile third-party payment software.
Currently, other third-party payment software can only use banknotes when Internet access is not available.
In addition, the payment experience of the central bank's digital renminbi will only be better than other payment methods, but because it has not been widely promoted, many advantages cannot be reflected.
Digital RMB pilot sinks to C-end users
Since the beginning of this year, there have been news of digital renminbi pilot projects. For example, civil servants in Suzhou have received part of the salary paid by digital renminbi; in Xiongan New District, 19 companies including McDonald’s are piloting digital renminbi; the Central Bank’s Digital Currency Research Institute has also cooperated with Didi reached a strategic cooperation, and also contacted B Station, Meituan and other institutions.
However, its test subjects are concentrated in small groups such as internal employees.
The Shenzhen digital renminbi red envelope pilot is the first large-scale test for ordinary people; from the perspective of progress, the pilot test of the central bank’s digital renminbi is gradually expanding to C-end users.
“Shenzhen’s digital renminbi red envelope pilot project conforms to the general environment of stimulating consumption, choosing a small retail scene, with low participation thresholds and open activities.” Li Lianxuan, chief researcher of Ouke Cloud Chain Research Institute, told the reporter of Securities Daily, “ Compared with previous pilots, Shenzhen's digital RMB red envelope test has made breakthroughs in object-oriented and scale. Since 2014, the pace of digital RMB exploration has never stopped, and it is getting closer and closer to full promotion."
In the view of Yu Weiren, the dean of the Top Research Institute and the vice president of the Shenzhen Information Service Industry Blockchain Association, in the era of mobile payment, technology is the support, and the scene is the key variable to attract users.
In an interview with the "Securities Daily" reporter, he said: "In the early application scenarios of the central bank's digital renminbi, it is particularly necessary to rely on leading Internet institutions for user drainage. At the same time, banks, clearing institutions and other multiple entities are working together. It appears that in subsequent application scenarios, the digital RMB will be more inclined to force the user side, sinking from the head enterprise to a single user, so that it has more life-oriented features to enhance the penetration rate." (Securities Daily)