The European Central Bank (ECB) launched Pontes on Monday, a platform that enables banks and other eligible financial institutions to settle tokenized-asset transactions in central-bank money.
ECB President Christine Lagarde announced the go-live at a Eurogroup meeting on Friday.
“Now, Pontes is, to summarize it quickly for you, it’s a digital euro made available for banks so that they can transact amongst themselves using tokenized assets and distributed ledger technology,” said Lagarde during a Eurogroup summit on Friday.
Pontes links market distributed-ledger technology platforms to the Eurosystem’s TARGET Services, enabling participating banks to settle tokenized wholesale transactions in central-bank money. It will only be available to eligible financial institutions and market infrastructure providers.
Tokenized bonds, funds and other financial assets need a reliable way to settle the cash side of a trade. Pontes gives…
