Panel 2, chaired by Professor Vincenzo Vespri, addressed the technological challenges of implementing digital currencies — and did so, by the chair's deliberate choice, as an open conversation rather than a sequence of talks. The starting question was disarmingly simple: since technology makes almost everything possible, what kind of central bank digital currency do we actually want? Professor Mauro Lombardi framed currency as a social agreement that has become extraordinarily hard to reach in a fragmented global landscape, arguing that monetary and technological sovereignty are now inseparable problems. Dr César Pérez-Chirinos Sanz, speaking as chair of the Spanish mirror committee of ISO/TC 307, set out to demystify received wisdom — beginning with the assumption that CBDCs require distributed ledger technology at all — and recalled how the Libra episode revealed that the disruptive impact of such systems lies less in the technology than in its use cases. Professor Claudio J. Tessone insisted on governance, interoperability and resilience, pointing to the decentralised architecture of the internet as the benchmark any payment infrastructure should aspire to, and to the global South's adoption of public blockchains as evidence of their practical value.

Dr Geoffrey Goodell brought the discussion back to first principles — what problem is digital currency actually solving? — arguing for cash-like bearer instruments held outside accounts, and for trusted protocols rather than trusted hardware as the foundation of privacy and security. Professor Andrea Bracciali traced digital money back to its cypherpunk origins, warning that a digitalised society transacting through a handful of private, non-European payment rails carries geopolitical risks of its own. A lively exchange with the audience — on trust, private versus public money, and the very need for a CBDC — confirmed that the technological questions are, in the end, institutional ones.