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The Hyperledger in Action: Central Bank Digital Currencies ebook is an official introduction to CBDCs, open-source development, Hyperledger technologies, and selected project case studies. The original 2022 edition is still available, but LF Decentralized Trust now promotes a newer CBDC ebook. Start with the current LF Decentralized Trust ebook page; use the older PDF when you specifically want the 2022 edition.
What is the Hyperledger CBDC ebook?
Hyperledger in Action: Central Bank Digital Currencies is a free ebook originally published by the Hyperledger Foundation. It introduces central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), explains the case the publication makes for open-source development, surveys Hyperledger projects, and describes selected CBDC experiments involving central banks and financial institutions.
It is best read as an ecosystem overview and case-study collection—not as a step-by-step deployment manual, a central-bank policy guide, or an independent comparison of all possible CBDC architectures. Hyperledger is an ecosystem of projects, not one blockchain and not the issuer of any currency. A CBDC would be issued by a central bank or other legally authorized public institution.
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1Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute2Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems3Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesThe original edition dates to 2022 and carries Hyperledger Foundation branding. A newer ebook is promoted by LF Decentralized Trust, the organization now associated with Hyperledger-related decentralized-technology projects. The 2022 PDF remains accessible, but it should not be mistaken for the latest edition.
Official download links
- Newer LF Decentralized Trust edition: Visit the official ebook page. The current-hosted PDF surfaced by that organization is LFDT_CBDC ebook V3.
- Original 2022 English edition: Download the Linux Foundation-hosted PDF. A copy is also hosted at LF Decentralized Trust.
- Japanese edition information: The Linux Foundation Japan announcement identifies the ebook and provides the Japanese download route.
These are official organization-hosted links rather than third-party document mirrors. Check the edition and any license notice in the particular file you download, especially before reusing its figures, tables, or substantial text. The 2022 PDF identifies a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 license.
What the 2022 edition covers
The older ebook’s contents move from an introduction to the Hyperledger Foundation and CBDCs to open source, Hyperledger projects, community work, international case studies, and further reading. It also includes a section on CBDCs at Hyperledger Global Forum and author biographies.
Its named geographic and project sections include the European Central Bank, France, Thailand, Project Inthanon-LionRock, Cambodia, Nigeria, Spain, Australia, and Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Treat these as historical case studies in the edition, not a live directory of current CBDC programs. Projects can change scope, pause, conclude, or move from research to pilot or launch; being described in an ebook does not establish present status or production use.
CBDC basics the ebook’s technology focus can obscure
A CBDC is digital money that is a liability of a central bank. It differs from ordinary commercial-bank account balances because of who owes the money, and from a private stablecoin because its issuer is the central bank. A CBDC does not, by definition, require blockchain or distributed-ledger technology: a central bank could use a conventional database, a DLT, or a hybrid architecture.
Rank #3
- Retail CBDC is intended for use by households and businesses; wholesale CBDC is aimed primarily at financial institutions and settlement.
- Account-based designs associate balances or access with accounts and identity; token-based designs represent value as digital tokens. Real systems may combine ideas from both.
- Direct models place more of the customer-facing relationship with the central bank; intermediated models rely on banks or other providers for activities such as wallets and customer service; hybrid designs divide responsibilities between public and private participants.
- Domestic use concerns payments within one jurisdiction. Cross-border use adds coordination across institutions, laws, currencies, and potentially national systems.
These are design dimensions, not mutually exclusive labels. A retail CBDC can, for example, use intermediaries and a token-like representation. Each choice raises policy and operational questions that a technology platform alone cannot answer.
How Hyperledger technologies may fit
The ebook’s case for Hyperledger centers on open development, shared governance, reusable software, and distributed ledgers for institutional settings. Permissioned systems can restrict participation to approved organizations and support identity controls, configurable governance, and business logic. Whether those characteristics are desirable depends on the central bank’s requirements; permissioning does not by itself guarantee privacy, resilience, or political decentralization.
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| Project | Potential role | Important qualification |
|---|---|---|
| Hyperledger Fabric | A modular permissioned ledger platform, with identity and access controls, smart-contract support, and configurable network components that may suit institutional participants. | It is a platform, not a complete CBDC design. Integrations, governance, privacy rules, and operations still need to be specified. |
| Hyperledger Iroha | Digital-asset and identity-oriented ledger technology. LF Decentralized Trust’s February 2025 announcement described Iroha 2.0 capabilities including role-based permissions, multisignature transactions, smart contracts, and WebAssembly support. | The announcement also referred to CBDC proofs of concept involving Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. A proof of concept is not evidence of a national launch or general production deployment. |
| Hyperledger Besu | An Ethereum client that the newer ebook material places in enterprise and interoperability experiments, including CBDC-related transaction flows. | Its presence in an experiment does not establish that Besu is the preferred or selected architecture for a central bank. |
| Hyperledger FireFly | An integration and orchestration layer that the newer material describes in Swift-related interoperability work involving data sharing, token management, and transaction orchestration. | FireFly is not itself a CBDC ledger or a currency. |
| Fabric-X | A newer effort presented for regulated digital-asset use cases, with a focus on areas such as privacy, compliance, scale, and settlement. | LF Decentralized Trust materials cite throughput claims, including more than 100,000 transactions per second. Treat such figures as project claims, not independently verified results for a particular CBDC workload. |
Open-source software can make code and development more visible, reduce dependence on a single software supplier, and let organizations reuse tools and expertise. It does not eliminate integration costs, security vulnerabilities, governance disputes, compliance obligations, or the need for specialist staff. A central bank may still depend on commercial integrators, cloud providers, security firms, and managed-service operators.
What the ebook does—and does not—establish
The publication is useful for learning why an open-source DLT ecosystem might appeal to public institutions and for locating historical examples to investigate further. Its advocacy for Hyperledger and open-source approaches should be understood as the perspective of the publishing ecosystem, not as an independent finding that a particular architecture is best.
It cannot, by itself, settle questions such as whether a country has legal authority to issue a CBDC, how issuance could affect monetary policy or financial stability, what privacy protections are adequate, or whether a proposed system is secure, affordable, or production-ready. Permissioned access is not the same as transaction privacy: designers must decide who can see which data, how roles are separated, what selective disclosure is possible, how offline payments work, and under what conditions wallet providers or authorities may access information.
Nor does a pilot, sandbox, or proof of concept demonstrate a national launch. These stages test a defined scenario; production operation involves a broader set of legal, institutional, operational, and public-policy requirements. Interoperability is another unresolved design challenge: any CBDC system may need to work with existing payment rails, banks, identity systems, government services, securities markets, or other jurisdictions’ systems.
Is it still worth reading?
Yes, if you want a concise introduction to Hyperledger’s CBDC work, a historical map of selected international experiments, or context for open-source governance in financial infrastructure. Technical readers can use it to identify projects and questions for deeper review.
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No, if you need a current status tracker, a neutral architecture comparison, a legal or economic assessment, a cybersecurity assurance case, or a cost estimate. For policy-oriented research, pair it with the IMF CBDC Virtual Handbook, which is intended as a reference for policymakers and central-bank or finance-ministry experts and is updated over time. For implementation research, consult current project documentation and primary sources from the relevant central bank or regulator.
In short, start with the newer LF Decentralized Trust page if you want the current organization’s ebook, and choose the 2022 PDF when you need the original Hyperledger-branded edition. Read either as an introduction and ecosystem perspective—not as proof that a particular ledger is suitable, deployed, or required for CBDC.
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