UK banks have moved tokenized sterling deposits out of the sandbox and into live customer transactions, testing remortgage and marketplace payments on shared infrastructure. It’s not a stablecoin or CBDC — just bank money with programmable rails, and interoperability is still the real hurdle.
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Lloyds, NatWest and Barclays are reportedly backing tokenized deposits as a bank-controlled alternative to USDT-style stablecoins. The pitch is faster interbank settlement without handing money rails to a private crypto issuer — but the details, and the scale, are still murky.
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Canada’s Big Six banks are reportedly exploring a tokenized deposits network, a move that could modernize payments while keeping money firmly inside the banking perimeter. It’s a potential win for speed and interoperability — but also a reminder that bank-controlled rails are not the same thing as decentralized finance.
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Canada’s Big Six banks are testing a shared tokenized deposit rail to move bank money faster between regulated institutions, keeping the rails inside the system instead of handing them to stablecoin issuers. Promising on speed and automation, but the real challenge is governance, interoperability, and actually making it work.
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Hong Kong is pushing tokenized finance from pilot mode into real market plumbing, targeting 24/7 wholesale CBDC settlement for tokenized deposits by the end of 2026. The plan spans derivatives, bonds, stablecoins, and bank money — with plenty of upside, and a few very real execution risks.
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India and Singapore have moved tokenization out of the lab and into live financial rails: India is piloting tokenized corporate bonds with digital rupee settlement, while Singapore’s biggest banks tested tokenized deposit transfers for interbank payments. Real plumbing, real money, real questions about scale.
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Citi and DBS completed a live Singapore-to-New York U.S. dollar payment in minutes using Swift’s Digital Ledger, showing tokenized deposits can work across borders even on a weekend. It’s a promising proof point for faster bank rails — but still a tightly controlled test, not a full rollout.
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Federal Reserve researchers are asking a very unsexy but important question: if stablecoins and tokenized money are being used like cash, should they count in M1 or M2? The framework says it depends on function, while also flagging messy issues like double-counting and global circulation.
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Tether is pushing back against the BIS, arguing fully reserved stablecoins are safer and more useful than bank-led tokenized deposits. The real battle is over who controls digital dollars: open, reserve-backed money on blockchain rails, or permissioned bank money kept inside the financial system.
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The BIS says stablecoins still don’t meet the test of money at scale, citing weaknesses in stability, interoperability, and compliance — and it’s backing tokenized bank deposits instead. The fight is now open crypto rails versus regulated bank money.
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