ECB Launches Pontes to Drive Tokenization

The European Central Bank (ECB) has announced that the Eurosystem will launch Pontes today (Monday), marking a major milestone in Europe’s transition toward tokenised financial markets.

The initiative provides official settlement infrastructure for real‑world asset (RWA) tokenization, letting trades settle using central bank money. Only credit institutions will be able to access and use the infrastructure. At first, it will run during normal European business hours, with round‑the‑clock settlement planned for later stages.

London's trading industry is coming home!

Indeed, tokenization is touted to be a solution to the problems inherent to round-the-clock trading, such as liquidity.

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However, broader adoption across Europe faces operational and regulatory hurdles. Market operators must ensure compliance with regimes such as Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) as they connect proprietary networks to the Eurosystem.

EU Builds Public Rails, US Leans on Wall Street

The launch highlights contrasting approaches between major financial hubs. The EU prioritises market safety and cross-border integration, using Pontes to offer a central‑bank‑money settlement alternative for wholesale tokenised markets.

By contrast, the US market is largely driven by Wall Street initiatives, with no federal equivalent to Pontes.

Last week, Nasdaq announced that it had invested US$100 million in Payward, the parent company of Kraken. The capital injection from Nasdaq’s venture arm aims to support the “continued evolution of tokenised market infrastructure.”

The New York Stock Exchange is also developing a blockchain platform designed to enable 24/7 trading of tokenized equities and ETFs.