Central Bank Digital Currency Strategy Training Course

Duration 10 days 16 modules · 65 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Central bank managers, Finance ministry officials and others
Fee from USD 2,200 KSh 190,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 16 Nov 2026 Course code SD-FT-030

Before you join: Participants should understand basic central banking functions, payment systems and the roles of commercial banks.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Central bank digital currency (CBDC) programmes require decisions that join monetary policy, payments, technology, law, data governance and public trust. A poorly defined CBDC can duplicate existing payment services, create bank-disintermediation risks, weaken privacy protections or impose operating costs without a clear public-policy benefit. Decision-makers need a disciplined method for determining whether a retail, wholesale or cross-border CBDC is justified, how it should operate and how it should be introduced.

This course equips participants to assess CBDC policy objectives, select design options and prepare an implementation strategy. Participants examine retail and wholesale CBDC models; direct, intermediated and hybrid operating structures; token-based and account-based instruments; privacy and identity choices; offline payments; programmable features; settlement arrangements; and cross-border interoperability. The course applies CPMI-IOSCO Principles for Financial Market Infrastructures, ISO 20022 messaging concepts and NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 to CBDC design decisions.

Instruction combines focused briefings with central-bank, commercial-bank and payment-system cases. Participants work in groups to define a CBDC problem statement, map stakeholders, compare design alternatives, assess monetary and financial-stability effects, draft governance controls and construct a phased implementation roadmap. They leave with a reusable CBDC strategy pack containing a policy case, target operating model, risk register, stakeholder plan and implementation roadmap.

The course suits central-bank staff, finance ministry officials, payment-system operators, financial-sector regulators, commercial-bank leaders and technology professionals contributing to a national or regional digital-money programme. It is also relevant to development-finance and public-sector teams assessing CBDC options where financial inclusion, payment resilience or cross-border remittances are policy priorities.

What you will be able to do

  • Assess CBDC policy rationales using a structured problem-definition and options-analysis method
  • Differentiate retail, wholesale and cross-border CBDC models against stated public-policy objectives
  • Design a CBDC target operating model covering roles, flows, governance and service management
  • Evaluate monetary policy, bank funding and financial-stability implications using scenario analysis
  • Apply CPMI-IOSCO PFMI principles to CBDC settlement, operational and governance arrangements
  • Specify privacy, identity, cybersecurity and data-governance controls for a CBDC proposition
  • Develop a phased CBDC implementation roadmap with pilots, decision gates and success measures
  • Present a complete CBDC strategy pack supported by evidence, risk analysis and design choices

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Build credibility when contributing to CBDC policy and design decisions
  • Translate technical CBDC architecture into operational and regulatory requirements
  • Assess competing CBDC proposals using defined policy and risk criteria
  • Prepare defensible briefing materials for senior committees and public consultations
  • Develop a portfolio-ready CBDC strategy pack for current or future programmes

For your organisation

  • Produces clearer CBDC decisions linked to measurable public-policy objectives
  • Reduces avoidable design risk before costly pilots and technology procurement
  • Aligns policy, payments, legal, technology and risk stakeholders around shared choices
  • Improves preparedness for domestic and cross-border digital-money developments
  • Creates reusable governance, risk and roadmap artefacts for programme mobilisation

Course modules

16 modules over 10 days

Participants can define a CBDC problem statement, policy mandate and decision criteria.

  • CBDC definitions, monetary forms and distinctions from crypto-assets
  • Public-policy objectives: payments, inclusion, resilience, competition and sovereignty
  • Problem trees separating root causes from proposed digital-money solutions
  • Theory of change linking CBDC features to intended outcomes
  • Strategic options appraisal using costs, benefits, risks and dependencies
  • Decision criteria and evidence thresholds for CBDC programme approval

Participants can compare CBDC models and prioritise viable use cases.

  • Retail, wholesale and cross-border CBDC objectives compared systematically
  • General-purpose, restricted-purpose and programmable money use-case boundaries
  • Person-to-person, merchant, government and institutional payment journeys
  • Wholesale securities settlement, intraday liquidity and delivery-versus-payment applications
  • Use-case prioritisation matrix scoring value, feasibility, risk and urgency
  • Demand assumptions tested against existing payment instruments and behaviours

Participants can analyse how CBDC design choices affect money creation and monetary transmission.

  • Central-bank money, commercial-bank money and payment token characteristics
  • Monetary policy transmission channels affected by retail CBDC holdings
  • Interest-bearing CBDC, tiered remuneration and holding-limit design
  • Deposit substitution scenarios using household and business balance-sheet assumptions
  • Bank funding, credit supply and liquidity-management implications
  • Stress scenarios for rapid conversion from deposits into CBDC

Participants can assess financial-stability risks and market-structure consequences of CBDC.

  • Run-risk channels during bank stress and payment disruption
  • Scenario analysis for disintermediation, liquidity shocks and flight-to-safety
  • Competition effects among banks, fintechs and payment service providers
  • Intermediary incentives under direct, hybrid and intermediated CBDC models
  • Safeguards: holding caps, remuneration tiers and conversion frictions
  • Financial-stability indicators incorporated into CBDC monitoring dashboards

Participants can select a coherent CBDC architecture aligned with policy and operational requirements.

  • Account-based and token-based CBDC authentication models compared
  • Centralised databases, permissioned ledgers and hybrid architecture trade-offs
  • Direct, intermediated and hybrid operational-model role allocation
  • Two-tier distribution structures and private-sector service responsibilities
  • Functional requirements traced from priority payment journeys
  • Architecture decision records documenting assumptions, choices and unresolved questions

Participants can map CBDC payment flows, settlement rules and operational responsibilities.

  • End-to-end payment flow mapping from initiation through final settlement
  • Settlement finality, irrevocability and legal certainty requirements
  • Real-time gross settlement and deferred net settlement comparisons
  • Liquidity tools for intermediaries, merchants and wholesale participants
  • Exception handling for rejected, duplicated and disputed payment instructions
  • Service-level measures covering availability, latency, capacity and recovery

Participants can define interoperability requirements for domestic and cross-border CBDC use.

  • ISO 20022 message concepts for payment and settlement interoperability
  • Interoperability layers: technical, semantic, legal and business alignment
  • Cross-border payment corridors, correspondent banking and foreign-exchange arrangements
  • Multi-CBDC platforms and common settlement mechanism design choices
  • Foreign-exchange conversion, liquidity provision and settlement-risk controls
  • Data localisation and jurisdictional conflicts in cross-border transactions

Participants can specify proportionate identity, privacy and financial-crime controls for CBDC.

  • Digital identity assurance levels and customer due-diligence requirements
  • Privacy-by-design principles applied to transaction-data collection and access
  • Tiered wallets balancing access, transaction limits and verification
  • AML/CFT controls using risk-based customer and transaction monitoring
  • Sanctions screening, suspicious activity reporting and investigative audit trails
  • Lawful-access governance, retention schedules and independent oversight mechanisms

Participants can design cybersecurity and operational-resilience controls for CBDC services.

  • NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 applied to CBDC control design
  • Threat modelling using assets, actors, attack paths and impacts
  • Cryptographic key management, hardware security modules and credential recovery
  • Operational resilience tolerances for critical CBDC business services
  • Offline payment risk controls, value limits and synchronisation rules
  • Incident response playbooks for cyberattack, fraud and service outage

Participants can identify legal changes and regulatory controls needed for CBDC issuance.

  • Central-bank mandate analysis for issuing digital legal tender
  • Legal tender, finality and creditor-discharge implications for CBDC
  • Consumer protection requirements for errors, fraud and redress
  • Data protection obligations, consent models and processor accountability
  • Procurement, outsourcing and third-party risk management requirements
  • Legislative gap assessment structured by authority, obligation and remedy

Participants can construct a CBDC target operating model with accountable governance arrangements.

  • Target operating model covering people, process, technology and governance
  • RACI matrices for central bank, intermediaries and technology providers
  • Three-lines model applied to CBDC risk and control ownership
  • CPMI-IOSCO PFMI principles relevant to CBDC governance and operations
  • Service management processes for onboarding, support, changes and incidents
  • Oversight committees, escalation thresholds and management-information packs

Participants can create a CBDC risk register and assurance plan linked to design decisions.

  • Risk taxonomy covering policy, operational, cyber, legal and reputational risks
  • Inherent and residual risk scoring using likelihood-impact matrices
  • Key risk indicators with thresholds, owners and reporting frequencies
  • Control design mapped to threats, failure modes and consequences
  • Independent assurance across technology, operations, compliance and financial controls
  • Risk appetite statements for availability, privacy, fraud and settlement

Participants can prepare a stakeholder and communication plan for a CBDC programme.

  • Stakeholder mapping by influence, interest, impact and information needs
  • Consultation design for banks, merchants, consumer groups and fintechs
  • Public concerns about surveillance, access, fees and payment choice
  • Message architecture distinguishing policy intent from product functionality
  • Feedback analysis using coded themes, evidence strength and response actions
  • Communication triggers for pilots, incidents, policy changes and launch

Participants can design a CBDC pilot with measurable hypotheses, controls and decision gates.

  • Pilot hypotheses framed as testable policy, technical and behavioural assumptions
  • Cohort selection, wallet distribution and geographic-scope design
  • Success metrics for adoption, acceptance, reliability, inclusion and costs
  • Control groups and baseline measures for credible pilot evaluation
  • Pilot risk controls, contingency arrangements and participant safeguards
  • Decision gates for iteration, expansion, pause or termination

Participants can build a phased CBDC roadmap with dependencies, resources and governance gates.

  • Roadmap phases: research, prototype, pilot, readiness and scaled deployment
  • Workstream decomposition for policy, law, technology, operations and engagement
  • Critical-path analysis identifying dependencies, constraints and sequencing decisions
  • Business case components covering costs, benefits, funding and resource demand
  • Procurement strategy for platforms, integrators, wallets and managed services
  • Programme dashboards tracking milestones, risks, decisions and benefits realisation

Participants can build, review and present a complete CBDC strategy pack for senior decision-makers.

  • Policy case synthesising objectives, evidence, use cases and recommendations
  • Target operating model defining roles, flows, controls and accountability
  • Design-option assessment comparing architecture, privacy and distribution choices
  • Risk register and mitigation plan aligned with programme risk appetite
  • Phased roadmap with pilot gates, resources, dependencies and success measures
  • Executive presentation structured for challenge, decision and documented approval

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. CBDC policy case template
  2. CBDC target operating model
  3. Design-option assessment matrix
  4. CBDC risk register and control map
  5. Pilot evaluation framework
  6. Phased implementation roadmap

Who should attend

  • Central bank managers — responsible for digital currency policy, payments or monetary operations
  • Finance ministry officials — assessing fiscal, legal and public-value implications
  • Payments system leaders — planning future settlement and retail payment infrastructure
  • Financial sector regulators — evaluating prudential, conduct and market-structure consequences
  • Commercial bank executives — preparing for changes to deposits, payments and distribution
  • Technology and cybersecurity leaders — designing secure CBDC platforms and control environments

Skills and tools covered

CBDC policy analysisDigital currency designPayments architectureFinancial stability assessmentCBDC risk governanceImplementation roadmapping

Tools and standards

CPMI-IOSCO Principles for Financial Market Infrastructures, ISO 20022, NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0, RACI matrix

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings, guided analysis of CBDC initiatives and structured team work. Participants compare design choices through policy scenarios, payment-flow mapping, risk workshops and stakeholder negotiations. Cases reflect central-bank, commercial-bank, cross-border payments and financial-inclusion contexts. Facilitated simulations test choices concerning privacy, bank intermediation, offline payments and crisis operations. Each module adds material to a CBDC strategy pack, with instructor feedback used to strengthen assumptions, controls, implementation sequencing and senior-management recommendations.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should understand basic central banking functions, payment systems and the roles of commercial banks. Familiarity with monetary policy transmission, settlement processes, financial regulation or digital payments is useful. Participants should be able to read policy papers, assess operational risks and contribute to structured group discussions. Prior experience with blockchain, distributed ledger technology, software development, cryptography or CBDC projects is not required. The course explains technical concepts sufficiently for policy, operations, legal and business participants, while retaining the detail needed for informed design decisions.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

Participants should understand basic payment systems, central banking or financial regulation. Coding, cryptography and distributed ledger technology experience are not required.

Bring a laptop for group analysis and document preparation. Participants may also bring non-confidential policy papers, payment-flow diagrams or programme questions from their organisation.

It is designed for central banks, ministries of finance, regulators, payment operators, commercial banks and public-sector technology teams. The course works best for cross-functional participants involved in CBDC assessment or delivery.

This course focuses on sovereign digital money, public-policy objectives, payment-system operations and institutional controls. Blockchain is addressed as one possible technical design choice rather than the starting point for all decisions.

Participants develop a CBDC strategy pack that can be adapted for internal briefings, feasibility studies, pilot planning or stakeholder consultation. The templates support structured discussion between policy, legal, operations, technology and risk teams.

The first five days establish the policy case, economic implications, design options and payment architecture. The remaining days address controls, legal foundations, pilots, implementation planning and the final capstone presentation.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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