The digitalization of money is underway — but it’s not following a single path. I see at least four distinct models for digital representations of value, each with its own technical, political, and economic logic. While Brazil, with DREX, bets on a public and coordinated infrastructure, the United States is heading down a different road — with major implications for the future of global currency.
In Brazil, DREX is being developed as a public system for the tokenization of bank deposits, operated by authorized institutions and under regulatory governance. It is not a digital currency issued directly to citizens, but rather a settlement infrastructure. This architecture preserves the structure of the financial system, scales smart contracts, and maintains control over monetary policy. It’s a robust solution — technically sophisticated and legally secure — but it requires time, interoperability, and coordinated adoption across financial system participants.
In the United States, the strategy is different. Without an actively developing CBDC and with political resistance to the idea of a “state-issued digital currency,” the country seems to have let the market handle the digitalization of the dollar. And the market delivered. Stablecoins like USDT (Tether) and USDC (Circle) already move billions globally, functioning as tokenized versions of the dollar, backed by real reserves and operating on blockchain networks. Large companies like PayPal and Fidelity have issued their own coins. The digital dollar exists — it just wasn’t issued by the central bank. This model moves fast, drives innovation, and ensures global liquidity. On the other hand, it concentrates risk in private issuers, relies on corporate governance, and challenges traditional monetary policy and supervisory tools.
Then there are native cryptoassets like Bitcoin, Ether, and others issued by decentralized networks with no ties to states or corporations. These are algorithmic creations, governed by network consensus and open-source code. Bitcoin increasingly serves as a store of value, especially in countries with high inflation or institutional instability. Ethereum has become a platform for smart contracts, decentralized finance (DeFi), NFTs, and governance experiments. These assets are volatile, yes — but they are increasingly present in institutional macroeconomic strategies as alternatives to the dollar or gold. In this context, it’s worth remembering El Salvador’s 2021 experiment adopting Bitcoin as legal tender. While it drew global attention, it faced real challenges in user adoption, digital infrastructure, and public management. Still, it showed what can happen when a country hands over monetary function to a decentralized network.
Finally, we’re seeing the growing tokenization of real-world assets. Court-ordered payments, real estate, gold, carbon credits, investment fund shares, consortia, and cooperatives are being turned into digital representations — with varying degrees of interoperability, backing, and regulation. This is the digitization of the physical world, creating liquidity, fractional ownership, and access to new asset classes. In the U.S., there are already tokens backed by treasuries and private credit. In Brazil, experiments are emerging in controlled environments like the CVM sandbox, with future integration with DREX on the horizon. The intersection of tokenization and the traditional financial system may be the next frontier — both in terms of efficiency and inclusion.
We are witnessing the emergence of a new global monetary architecture. DREX, along with other CBDCs, represents the public, institutional, and coordinated route. Stablecoins represent the market-driven, fast-moving path. Native cryptos are the decentralized alternative. And asset tokenization is the bridge between the traditional and digital worlds. Brazil has a chance to play a strategic role in this new tokenized economy — as long as it builds bridges between these models.