Project Jura: cross-border settlement using wholesale CBDC

The global financial system needs better and more diverse payment and settlement arrangements to meet current and future demands. Existing arrangements are often slow, expensive, potentially risky and complex as they involve numerous intermediaries and financial market infrastructures. A new generation of infrastructures, based on distributed ledger technology (DLT), is emerging and several central banks are exploring use cases for wholesale central bank digital currency (wCBDC) with a view to potentially supporting a safe tokenised financial ecosystem. These novel technology‑driven approaches may offer greater choice and competition in terms of cross‑border payments and settlements, also by broadening access to central bank money for regulated financial institutions.

Project Jura explored the direct transfer of euro and Swiss franc wCBDCs between French and Swiss commercial banks on a single DLT platform operated by a third party. Tokenised asset and foreign exchange trades were settled safely and efficiently using payment versus payment (PvP) and delivery versus payment (DvP) mechanisms. The experiment was conducted in a near‑real setting, used real‑value transactions and met current regulatory requirements.

Issuing wCBDC on a third‑party platform and giving non‑resident financial institutions direct access to central bank money raises intricate policy issues. Jura explores a new approach including subnetworks and dual‑notary signing, which may give central banks comfort to issue wCBDC on a third‑party platform and to provide non‑resident financial institutions with access to wCBDC.

The project complements the ongoing G20 work on cross‑border payments. Specifically, it contributes to the building blocks on PvP adoption, multilateral platforms and CBDC by extending access to the safety of central bank money for cross‑border settlements. The proposed solution design not only addresses existing deficiencies but could also open up new approaches to conducting international financial transactions, including foreign exchange, securities and other financial instruments.

Jura is a public‑private collaboration involving the Banque de France (BdF), the BIS Innovation Hub (BISIH) Swiss Centre and the Swiss National Bank (SNB) and a consortium led by Accenture and comprising Credit Suisse, Natixis, R3, SIX Digital Exchange (SDX) and UBS. It leveraged the test environment of a DLT‑based Swiss licensed exchange and central securities depository for tokenised assets (SDX), and a newly developed issuance platform for unlisted commercial papers under French law (the Digital Asset Registry, DAR). Both platforms are based on Corda by R3.

It is essential for central banks to remain up‑to‑date with technological developments that could potentially enhance the functioning of the financial system. Project Jura shows how collaboration between central banks and the private sector, based on an open call for applications, can shed light on the potential of tokenisation and DLT in cross‑border settlements. While the experiment demonstrates the technical feasibility of using wCBDCs for this purpose, the decision will rest with individual central banks as to whether and how they will further explore the issuance of wCBDC.