The management of “electronic money” in the country

PayPhone, a private company that created a tool to make mobile payments and other transactions with the cell phone number was established in Cuenca two years ago; To date 5,000 stores have been affiliated nationwide.

The executive president of this company Carlos Ugalde believes that electronic money is very healthy for the country and the government should provide information regarding its benefits.

Otherwise people “are going to think that this is a mechanism by which the government wants to issue money without support. A large percentage of the population thinks that it could be dangerous to have a new currency,” warns Ugalde.

Carlos Ugalde anticipates: “as long as electronic money is handled by the Central Bank, the issuance of money is not controlled by anyone and nobody can guarantee that that money is actually being backed by physical money.”

Consequently, “if it is handled by private banks, it will generate that confidence factor because obviously, private banking can not generate inorganic emission as the Central Bank can do.” (I)