Central bank

European Central Bank

Responsible for euro area monetary policy since 1 January 1999 and operator of TARGET Services, it committed in July 2025 to a two-track approach to distributed ledger settlement: Pontes, piloting in the third quarter of 2026, and Appia.

Kind Central bank

Jurisdiction European Union

Founded 1998

Stories filed 3

The profile

Established on 1 June 1998 and responsible for euro area monetary policy since 1 January 1999, it operates TARGET Services with the national central banks of the Eurosystem. On 1 July 2025 it committed to a two-track approach to distributed ledger settlement: Pontes, whose pilot is planned for the third quarter of 2026, links market DLT platforms to TARGET Services so that delivery-versus-payment transactions settle either in cash tokens on a Eurosystem DLT platform or finally in T2, synchronised through the Hash-Link protocol; Appia is the longer-horizon track with no launch date set. Separately, the digital euro pilot is scheduled to begin in the second half of 2027 and run for twelve months, with possible first issuance from 2029 and only once the enabling regulation is adopted. Its position is that tokenized markets should keep central bank money as the settlement anchor rather than migrate to privately issued substitutes.

Frameworks and functions

Pontes: Eurosystem DLT solution connecting market platforms to TARGET Services, settling either in cash tokens on the Eurosystem platform or in T2, with a pilot planned for the third quarter of 2026.
Appia: Longer-term workstream on an integrated European tokenisation and DLT ecosystem, still at the analysis stage with no launch date announced.
Digital euro: Retail central bank digital currency with a twelve-month pilot from the second half of 2027 and possible issuance from 2029, subject to EU legislation.

Coverage

Developments in which European Central Bank is a named party, newest first.

Central bank money

European Parliament adopts negotiating position on the digital euro regulation

The European Parliament approved its position on the digital euro regulation on 9 July 2026, following a committee vote in June.

9 Jul 2026 Banca d'Italia 4 reports

Regulation

European Commission opens MiCA review consultation targeting multi-jurisdiction stablecoin issuance

The European Commission opened a two-part consultation on revising the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation in May 2026, with responses due by 30 August 2026.

20 May 2026 European Commission 5 reports

Stablecoins European Union

Tokenized capital markets

ECB study finds tokenised bonds lowered borrowing costs but not operational costs

The European Central Bank published a study of the tokenised bond market in Issue 33 of its Macroprudential Bulletin on 13 April 2026, comparing matched samples of tokenised and conventional European corporate bonds.

13 Apr 2026 ECB Macroprudential Bulletin Issue 33 3 reports

Corporate debt European Union

On the record

27 May 2026

Project Agorá prototype results published, with real-value testing to follow

The Bank for International Settlements reported that the Project Agorá prototype showed tokenisation of central bank reserves and commercial bank deposits can support atomic multi-currency settlement across jurisdictions while leaving each central bank in control of its own money and preserving transaction privacy. Seven central banks and more than 40 private financial institutions took part, and the project said the work would advance to real-value transactions in certain currencies.

Research Global Tokenized deposits Bank for International Settlements: Project Agorá shows how tokenisation can improve wholesale cross-border payments ↗

1 Jul 2025

ECB Governing Council approves two-track plan for DLT settlement in central bank money

The ECB Governing Council approved a plan for settling distributed ledger technology transactions in central bank money on two tracks. Pontes is to link DLT platforms to TARGET Services, with a pilot planned by the end of the third quarter of 2026; Appia examines a longer-term integrated tokenised ecosystem. The decision followed exploratory work between May and November 2024 that involved 64 participants and more than 50 trials.

Institutional pilot European Union European Central Bank: ECB commits to distributed ledger technology settlement plans with dual-track strategy ↗

4 Dec 2024

Eurosystem completes its exploratory work on DLT-based wholesale settlement

The ECB reported the conclusion of Eurosystem trials and experiments settling transactions recorded on distributed ledgers against central bank money. 64 participants ran more than 200 transactions across more than 40 trials and experiments between May and November 2024, with a combined value of about €1.59bn.

Institutional pilot European Union Government securities European Central Bank MIP news ↗

Official

www.ecb.europa.eu ↗

Analysis

Sources

ECB: Eurosystem commits to distributed ledger technology settlement plans with dual-track strategy ecb.europa.eu · 25 Jul 2026
ECB: Pontes ecb.europa.eu · 25 Jul 2026
ECB: The digital euro: preparing for a potential launch (24 March 2026) ecb.europa.eu · 25 Jul 2026
ECB: The European System of Central Banks and the Eurosystem ecb.europa.eu · 25 Jul 2026