Commercial Bank of Dubai Completes Digital Dirham Transfers With Bank of China via Jisr

CBD said the transaction showed that both banks could carry out a digital dirham payment from start to finish, from initiation to settlement on the platform. It said the step supports continuing work to build cross-border payments in digital dirhams between the UAE and China. The bank did not give the value of the transfer or say whether it was a live commercial payment or a test.

This matters for the UAE's push to settle trade with its largest partners without going through correspondent banks and dollar clearing. CBD's statement describes Jisr, Arabic for "bridge", as a platform for settling cross-border transactions in central bank digital currencies through bilateral links between the UAE and participating markets. Wholesale digital currency of this kind is used for transfers between financial institutions, not by retail customers.

The lender said the transaction builds on its part in the central bank's earlier cross-border wholesale digital currency projects. With Jisr, it said, it has now completed bilateral wholesale digital dirham transfers. In January 2024 the central bank made the UAE's first cross-border digital dirham payment, sending 50 million dirhams to China over the multi-country mBridge platform.

Bernd van Linder, CBD's chief executive, said the bank's role in the Digital Dirham programme reflected its long-term commitment to the central bank's plans for a modern, secure financial system. He said the bank wanted to help develop cross-border payments and support the UAE's position as a global centre for trade and finance.

Vladislavs Mironovs, the bank's chief digital officer, said completing the transaction with Bank of China showed CBD could carry out cross-border payments in digital dirhams, and that it would keep working on further uses of the currency in cross-border payments.

CBD said the work forms part of its corporate payments strategy, which aims to improve international financial connections. It said it would continue to work with the central bank, Bank of China and other partners on the digital dirham, within the regulator's requirements. Neither bank has said when such transfers might be offered to corporate clients.