JD.com Begins Accepting China’s CBDC for Singles’ Day Payments

E-commerce giant, JD.com, began accepting Chinese CBDCs as a payment method on its platform during the Singles Day, an unofficial public holiday and shopping season in China. The digital yuan (eCNY) has not yet launched nationwide, but JD.com’s move to launch it over the holiday season shows the country is pushing for a large-scale CBDC trial. 

According to JD, over 100,000 people redeemed eCNY in the app during the Day of the Army, which started on October 31 and ended today. JD hosted eCNY in partnership with China Construction Bank  during this time. 

JD’s platform, eCNY search, is said to provide instructions for users  to download the Chinese digital currency application. Upon completion of these steps, users will receive eCNY worth $2.34 (£1.75) to spend on the platform. With CBDC testing during 

Liberation Day, the Chinese government wants to see how eCNY will perform in a large-scale environment. That’s because this holiday is famous for being an e-commerce giant that offers huge discounts and generates billions of dollars in sales. 

China continues to promote CBDC

This news comes after JD launched eCNY in partnership with a state-owned telecom bank earlier this year. As part of this collaboration, Communications Bank distributed $3.1 million (£2.31 million) worth of CBDCs to residents of Shanghai and Suzhou. As part of the promotion, JD helped hand out red envelopes containing 20 Yuan and 20 yuan JD.com coupons, respectively. 

Prior to that, JD was the first online platform to adopt eCNY  last December. In April of this year, the company said it had paid salaries to some of its CBDC employees. From December last year to June this year, over 450,000 people spent more than $15.6 million (£11.65 million) using eCNY on JD.com. JD hasn’t released details about eCNY’s spending since then. With the 

Winter Olympics approaching, China is increasingly pushing for a large-scale launch of CBDCs. The effort sparked controversy after reports were released that  US companies were forcing them to switch to eCNY. According to the report, China has forced McDonald’s to expand  CBDC testing, despite  270 restaurants already implementing it.