The Bank of England has launched a new industry experimentation initiative to explore how tokenized assets could be settled using synchronized, atomic settlement in British pounds sterling as part of efforts to modernize the UK’s real-time gross settlement (RTGS) infrastructure.
The Synchronisation Lab initiative will allow 18 selected companies to test delivery-versus-payment and payment-versus-payment settlement between the BoE’s next-generation RTGS core ledger, known as RT2, and external distributed-ledger platforms, in a non-live environment without using real money, according to a bank statement.
The six-month pilot, scheduled to start in spring 2026, is intended to validate the central bank’s design choices for synchronized settlement, assess interoperability between central bank money and tokenized assets, and inform the development of a potential future live RTGS synchronization capability.
Originally announced in October, the initiative brings together 18 participants, including market infrastructure providers, banks, fintechs and decentralized-technology companies to test use cases spanning tokenized securities settlement, collateral optimisation, foreign exchange and digital-money issuance.
Among the Web3 participants, Chainlink and UAC Labs will test decentralized approaches to coordinating synchronized settlement between central bank money and assets issued on distributed-ledger platforms. Companies such as Ctrl Alt and Monee will focus on delivery-versus-payment settlement for tokenized gilts and other securities.
Other participants, including Tokenovate and Atumly, will test conditional margin payment workflows and digital-money issuance and redemption flows designed to coordinate with RTGS settlement. The roster also includes Swift and LSEG.
The bank said the work of the lab initiative will be used to refine the design of its RTGS synchronization capability and support further development work, with participants expected to present their use cases and findings following the conclusion of the program.
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Global central banks expand pilots
The Bank of England is just one of a roster of central banks exploring how tokenization, programmable settlement and digital currencies could reshape their core monetary and payment systems.
In May, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Bank for International Settlements published research from Project Pine examining how smart contracts could support monetary policy in tokenized financial systems, including a prototype toolkit for faster and more flexible central bank actions on programmable ledgers.
In October, the Monetary Authority of Singapore announced BLOOM, an initiative aimed at expanding settlement infrastructure to support transactions in tokenized bank liabilities and regulated stablecoins.
Beyond tokenization pilots focused on settlement and market infrastructure, central banks have also been running experiments with central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).
In Australia, the central bank launched a wholesale digital currency trial in July using stablecoins, tokenized bank deposits and a pilot CBDC.
This was followed by the United Arab Emirates completing its first government payment with a digital dirham in November, and China-led mBridge reporting in January that it had processed $55 billion in cross-border CBDC transactions across multiple jurisdictions.
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