The Bank for International Settlements and the Institute of International Finance have published a report on Project Agorá concluding that tokenisation and programmable technology can reduce long-standing inefficiencies in wholesale cross-border payments at scale while keeping settlement in central bank reserves safe and intact. The prototype showed that atomic settlement of wholesale cross-border transaction chains can be completed on an all-or-nothing basis using tokenised central bank reserves and tokenised commercial bank deposits, with the findings indicating this can be done securely and with finality across currencies and jurisdictions. The exploratory work involved seven participating jurisdictions and more than 40 private sector financial institutions. According to the report, the prototype's layered architecture would let central banks retain control over their own currencies and operations within a shared interoperable platform, while privacy protections can operate at both balance and transaction level and still support regulatory compliance. The legal analysis found settlement finality is achievable across all seven jurisdictions, although further work is needed to define the technical, operational and contractual arrangements that fit each jurisdiction's legal framework. The report also says the modular design could support conditional and always-on payments and future enhancements in anti-money laundering, countering the financing of terrorism, sanctions compliance and fraud detection. The project will now advance to further testing, including real-value transactions involving certain currencies and participants. The Bank of Canada has joined the project, and future work is expected to give the private sector a larger role alongside continued engagement from participating central banks.
Bank for International Settlements2026-05-27
Bank for International Settlements says Project Agorá prototype can enable atomic wholesale cross-border settlement and will move to real-value testing
The Bank for International Settlements and the Institute of International Finance published a Project Agorá report finding that tokenisation and programmable technology can reduce inefficiencies in wholesale cross-border payments while preserving settlement in central bank reserves. The prototype demonstrated atomic settlement of tokenised central bank reserves and commercial bank deposits across currencies and jurisdictions, with a layered architecture supporting central bank control, privacy, regulatory compliance and enhanced financial crime controls. The project will move to testing with real-value transactions, a larger private sector role and the addition of the Bank of Canada.