The digital yuan operations center said several participating banks now support an offline payment QR code function in their e-CNY wallets, allowing users to present a payment code through the app even when network access is unavailable or weak. The newly supported institutions are Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of Communications, Postal Savings Bank of China, and Industrial Bank, with the feature set to expand to more operators later. According to the announcement, the system can automatically switch to an offline payment code when a user faces network interruptions or poor signal, without requiring manual setup or extra steps. Merchants can then complete the transaction by scanning the code. The operations center also said users need to have the small-amount password-free payment setting enabled before using the offline code. If they have also turned on the top-up-on-use function in advance, payments can still go through even when wallet balance is insufficient.

China’s digital yuan has been used in the domestic futures market for the first time, with Dalian Commodity Exchange completing a storage fee payment supported by Bank of Communications and Bank of China.