58

This article applies the title of the play “The Trojan War Will Not Take Place” to payments, but in the form of an open question. To help answer it, the content parodies the title of a famous Western film, which becomes “The Good, the Rough, and the Fiery”. The “good” refers to what works reasonably well: namely, secure physical cash, which serves as the ultimate form of liquidity, and the useful technology of the blockchain, to be distinguished from Bitcoin. The “rough” is more debatable, some see it as a “diamond,” others as “a bit dodgy”: it ranges from the riskiest native cryptoassets to stablecoins backed by a currency, all subject to emerging regulations. The “fiery” encompasses forthcoming central bank digital currencies (CBDC) and extends to the ties between the dollar’s centrality and the role of crypto-assets in “Trumponomics”. While the jury is still out about the use of monies in the form of means of payment (not to mention settlement systems) as weapons in global economic and financial wars, their role in the geopolitical arsenal is clear! JEL classification: E40, E42, E58, F33, F50, G23, H63.