The rise of tokenised money market funds

Key takeaways 

• Tokenised money market funds (TMMFs) are a fast-growing collateral asset and savings instrument in the crypto ecosystem. Like stablecoins, TMMFs circulate on public permissionless blockchains but offer returns at money market rates and regulatory protections as securities.
• TMMFs currently cater strongly to decentralised finance protocols and rely on "allow-listing" of blockchain wallets to constrain peer-to-peer trading of their tokens to ensure regulatory compliance. However, such allow lists only constrain direct holding of TMMFs.
• TMMFs give rise to risks that mirror, and potentially amplify, those found in conventional money market funds, such as liquidity mismatches, as well as the operational and anti-money laundering / countering the financing of terrorism-related risks associated with stablecoins.

The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the BIS.