The Mexican Undersecretary of Finance, Arturo Herrera, said that on April 1 he would start this program in his pilot test, in which the largest banks operating in Mexico will participate.

As of September, it will be mandatory for all institutions that have more than 3,000 client accounts.

The largest banks, such as BBVA Bancomer, Citibanamex, Santander and Banorte, have declared themselves ready to start the tests. However, according to the statements of the Undersecretary of Finance, the benefits will not be seen in the short term, but we will have to see how the pilot tests will work, and from there to spread it to the whole country. For this, we will have to wait until 2020.

CoDi seeks to reduce the use of cash and combat corruption and informality, as well as banking the millions of Mexicans who are now outside the formal financial system.

Three programs

To begin with the change of culture in terms of payments, the federal government, jointly with the banks, has decided to start the pilot tests through three segmented programs as explained a few days ago by the Undersecretary of Finance.

One of these programs will have to do with government support aimed at young people, with a specific geographical coverage, given that it is the sector most familiar with smartphones and new technologies.

The other pilot program in which CoDi will be tested is related to a medium-sized community (around 150,000 inhabitants), to see how it works at that magnitude and how technology is adopted.

The third pilot will be applied in a very small community, where there are practically no banking services of any kind. The result of the pilot tests in these three modalities will derive in how the national level advances.