Policy Briefs
Clear policy briefs connect the product and protocol model to older minting and treasury functions, public-sector digital-cash experiments, and institutional questions about authority, custody, privacy, and recognition.
They are written for leaders, operators, policy makers, and partners who need to understand what Clear is trying to make possible before going deep into deployment details or protocol mechanics.
Old Function, New Tools
Clear applies modern cryptography to an organizational treasury function that is thousands of years old. This brief places Mint Notes beside ancient administrative records, corporate treasury, community vouchers, and the distinction between governance and operation.
Embracing an Older Pattern
For centuries and millennia, mints have turned authority, standards, marks, and public recognition into portable bearer instruments. This brief explains why Clear should be read as a continuation of that older pattern, using Mint Notes, keyset-bound Clear Mint Units (CMUs), and explicit issuer policy.
Credit, Coinage and Clear
Drawing on David Graeber's account of the long oscillation between credit systems and coinage systems, this brief starts from the oscillation itself and then explains why Clear sits in the middle: credit-like in meaning, coin-like in circulation, cryptographic in form, and redeemable by treasury policy.
Goldsmiths and Clear
London goldsmith-bankers are often remembered through a misleading story about warehouse receipts and hidden lending. Drawing on George Selgin's historical analysis, this brief explains why the distinction between custody, debt, authority, and transferable claims matters for Clear's treasurer model.
MintChip and Clear
The Royal Canadian Mint's MintChip project explored secure, cash-like digital payments before today's central bank digital currency (CBDC) debates became mainstream. This brief compares MintChip's national-currency stored-value model with Clear's minting model: private bearer notes for issuer-defined treasury units.
Clear Is Not a Stablecoin
Stablecoins usually move account balances through blockchain smart contracts. Clear uses Chaumian Mint Notes: private bearer proofs issued for a specific CMU, transferred between holders, and checked against the issuing mint's spent-proof state. This brief explains why that mechanism is different from stablecoin payment rails and token contracts.
Hidden Complexity and Clear
Research from the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) shows that public blockchain data can be technically transparent while remaining economically ambiguous. This brief explains why Clear should make issuer policy, exact CMU identity, treasurer authority, and redemption meaning explicit before Mint Notes circulate.
QxVault and Clear
QxVault packages OpenBao-compatible secrets management with an integrated Hardware Security Module (HSM). This brief explains why that matters for Clear: per-CMU keyset secrets, mint service keys, operator credentials, and future signing boundaries need production custody without replacing Clear's treasury authority model.