The Bank of Canada said it has completed an experiment testing how tokenized bonds can move through financial markets alongside a group of the country’s largest lenders.
The government’s Export Development Canada issued a C$100 million ($73 million) security with a maturity of less than three months, which was sold to a closed group of investors.
Also participating in the test, known as Project Samara, were RBC Dominion Securities, RBC Investor Services Trust and the TD Securities division of Toronto-Dominion Bank. The group tested how bonds issued by EDC can be created, traded and settled using distributed ledger technology.
The platform, operated by RBC, supported the entire lifecycle of a bond transaction. The bond was issued in tokenized form on the ledger, allowing participants to submit bids, process coupon payments, redeem bonds, and trade in secondary markets through the same system.
The experiment also tested digital settlement using tokenized versions of wholesale Canadian dollars created and managed by the Bank of Canada. These digital funds moved on the same ledger as the bonds, allowing transactions to be settled within the platform.
In its November budget, the federal government signaled plans to introduce legislation regulating stablecoins backed by Canadian dollars, with oversight expected to involve the Bank of Canada and rules to focus on reserve backing, redemption policies and risk management.
Last month, the country’s investment regulator CIRO introduced a digital asset custody framework aimed at strengthening the way trading platforms hold crypto assets, tightening standards to reduce risks such as hacking, fraud and insolvency following past industry failures.
