Barclays, Citi, Mastercard and Visa Joining UK Pilot for Tokenized Deposits Testing: Report

Leading banks and credit card giants are reportedly now participating in a tokenized deposits pilot project launched by industry body UK Finance.

According to a new report by Bloomberg, companies that include Barclays, Citigroup, Mastercard and Visa are teaming up for the effort.

The project aims to create a commercial banking system for tokenized deposits and securities to make transactions across borders and systems easier and faster as well as reduce errors and fraud.

The UK Finance pilot, called the “Regulated Liability Network,” is designed as a shared ledger with the capability to track banking payments. Network participants can record, transfer and settle transactions across central bank money, commercial bank money and electronic money.

Says Gilbert Verdian, the CEO of Quant, which is providing blockchain technology for the pilot,

“Banks see the need for programmable payments today. It’s quite a game changer for them because business models can operate in a more efficient way because they are not limited by the shackles of the current payment system.”

According to Bloomberg, the results of the pilot will be published in August.

Additional participants are being invited to join in on the pilot in July, including yet-to-be-named fintech startups and technology companies to test products related to tokenized commercial bank money.

The project also envisions the platform being used by asset managers to tokenize their funds and for the settlement of mortgages using programmable funds.

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