Project Rialto: improving instant cross-border payments using central bank money settlement (technical report)

Rialto focused on low-value transactions such as remittances and other person-to-person payments executed via the traditional banking channel. Despite past efforts to reduce the inefficiencies associated with such payments, FX and settlement remain key frictions.

In the search for more efficient options, there has been an increasing focus on instant payment-versus-payment (PvP) solutions that allow for fast and reliable access to liquidity in foreign currency.

Rialto's technical experiment combined PvP and automated FX with tokenised central bank money settlement in a simulated cross-border payment infrastructure by building on previous work by the BIS Innovation Hub such as Project Mariana and Project Nexus.

The technical report describes the Project Rialto proof of concept, its architecture and design as well as the economic considerations regarding the viability of the Rialto technical approach.