Collapsing retail and wholesale for a universal CBDC

As the new generation of financial infrastructure takes shape, the need for sophisticated tools to inform policy-makers is growing. To encourage innovation and preserve security, it is vital that policy-makers have the capacity to interact with and closely supervise new systems. Sandboxes are a key tool for this process. Carmelle Cadet, chief executive officer and founder of EmTech joins OMFIF to discuss the nuances of how sandboxes work and how they should be constructed.

Discussions around central bank digital currencies typically begin with the intended use case. If the CBDC is for retail use, then all the subsequent discussions focus on retail, and the reverse is true for wholesale. The two are treated as separate discussions. Abbas Albasha, senior strategy consultant at Giesecke+Devrient joins Lewis McLellan, head of content at OMFIF’s Digital Monetary Institute, to discuss why this approach is too restrictive, pointing out that a single CBDC system can be designed to meet both retail and wholesale needs flexibly without need for two separate systems.

Max Castelli, head of strategy for sovereign institutions, and Philipp Salman, director of strategy for sovereign institutions at UBS Asset Management, join Yara Aziz, senior economist at OMFIF, to discuss how shifting geopolitics shaped reserve management in 2025, and what sovereign investors should watch for in 2026. They cover the macro outlook, longer-term portfolio strategy, US concentration risk and the debate around the dollar’s role in reserves.

In the coming year, renewed attention should be made to explore how governments can shift from simply spending more to spending smarter. Drawing on new insights from the International Monetary Fund and fresh empirical work from OMFIF and EY, we examine why productive public investment remains elusive, what distinguishes high-performing public institutions and how fiscal policies can better support high-productive investment.   Mark MacDonald, global public finance management leader at EY, and Galen Sheer, senior economist, fiscal affairs at the IMF, join Andrea Correa, senior economist at OMFIF, to unpack the practical reforms finance ministries can take, from improving allocative and technical efficiency to building credible evaluation systems, and offer next steps that policy-makers can act on immediately to drive better long-term outcomes.

Sovereign debt scholar Anna Gelpern, Scott K. Ginsburg professor of law and international finance at Georgetown University, joins Mark Sobel, US chair at OMFIF, to discuss the theory of the case for debt transparency, the need for more and better public debt disclosure and the impact of poor disclosure on low-income countries and emerging markets.    Gelpern also explores ideas on how to tackle the challenge, and shares an update on the Sovereign Debt Forum's Public Debt Is Public project with Georgetown’s Massive Data Institute.

European fixed income has been 'normalising' over 2025. Inflation is stabilising, the European Central Bank has halted rates near neutral, spreads are tight but markets are steady. Yet political and fiscal divergences remain sharp within the European Union with Italian BTPs now regularly pricing through French OATs. The EU’s rapid expansion as a AAA issuer is altering Europe’s credit market structure and raising the prospect of a genuine euro safe asset. Conor Perry, economist at OMFIF’s Economic and Monetary Policy Institute, is joined by Jeremy Cunningham, investment director at Capital Group, to examine these developments. They discuss OAT-BTP repricing, investor-base effects on yield sensitivity, the impact of unified EU issuance and the outlook for 2026.

Dennis Shen, chair of the macroeconomic council and lead global economist at Scope Ratings, joins Mark Sobel, OMFIF US chair, to discuss the global economic outlook entering 2026, prospects for the US, China, Europe and Japan, alongside the key global economic challenges and risks.

In 2015, almost 200 countries signed the Paris agreement in a landmark commitment to limit the impact of global warming. Ten years on, Rahul Ghosh, global head of sustainable finance at Moody’s Ratings, and Umar Ashfaq, research director for the Americas at the MSCI Institute, join Sarah Moloney, editorial director at OMFIF, to examine how much progress has been made in the decade since and whether there is still a place for such international agreements in a more divided world.

Stablecoins are dominating the headlines and policy-makers are responding rapidly. The instruments, though once primarily used as a trading pair for crypto-assets, are rapidly gaining a foothold in cross-border payments where their speed and low cost make them an attractive alternative in some corridors. Eyes are also on their potential adoption for wholesale settlement.    Thibault Pelé, head of product for digital currency at Worldline, joins Lewis McLellan, head of content at OMFIF's Digital Monetary Institute, to discuss the evolving uses of stablecoins and the promise this instrument shows in reshaping money.    

Governments today face mounting pressure to deliver more with fewer resources. Yet the way public money is managed often leans towards expenditure control rather than investment in long-term socioeconomic outcomes. Even when innovative policies or technical solutions exist, implementation barriers frequently prevent good ideas from being translated into results.  Adam Chepenik, principal, government and public sector, and Andrew Kleine, managing director, government and public sector at EY, join Andrea Correa, senior economist at OMFIF, to discuss how governments can invest in outcomes, prepare for crises and make their financial choices more sustainable, impactful and politically appealing.