China is already on its way of doing this. WeChat (built by Tencent, a government supported company) is the payment platform between businesses and customers nowadays. As soon as China gets reliable internet and power into its western parts, everything will become digital.
Just being digital isn't equal to a cryptocurrency.
I'm aware of Wechat and how pretty much everything is connected to it now. I'm more wondering of the global political-economic consequences of China beating the US at this.