Bank of Canada Completes First Tokenized Bond Issuance

6 days ago

KEY FACTS: The Bank of Canada, in collaboration with Export Development Canada (EDC), Royal Bank of Canada (RBC Capital Markets and RBC Investor Services), and TD Bank Group (TD Securities), has successfully completed Project Samara, a pilot that resulted in Canada's first tokenized bond issuance. EDC issued a C$100 million (approximately US$73.6 million) short-term bond with a maturity of less than three months, sold to a closed group of investors and fully managed on a purpose-built distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform based on Hyperledger Fabric. The experiment demonstrated the full bond lifecycle—including issuance, investor bidding, secondary trading, coupon payments (if applicable), and redemption—with near-instant atomic settlement using tokenized wholesale central bank deposits (W-CAD) issued by the Bank of Canada, achieving improvements in efficiency, reduced counterparty risk, and enhanced data integrity.

Source: Bank of Canada

Bank of Canada Completes First Tokenized Bond Issuance

The Bank of Canada, in collaboration with major financial institutions, has successfully completed Project Samara, a pilot program that resulted in the issuance of the country's first tokenized bond. This development marks an important step forward in exploring how distributed ledger technology (DLT) can modernize bond issuance, trading, and settlement processes.

The pilot, announced on March 5, 2026, involved key participants including Export Development Canada (EDC) as the issuer, Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) through its Capital Markets and Investor Services divisions, and TD Bank Group (TD). Together, they tested a purpose-built DLT platform to handle the full lifecycle of a bond in a controlled, real-world-like environment.

At the heart of the experiment was a C$100 million (approximately US$73.6 million) short-term bond issued by EDC, with a maturity of less than three months. The bond was sold to a closed group of investors and was fully tokenized, meaning it existed as a digital asset on the ledger rather than in traditional paper or book-entry form. The platform enabled seamless processes including issuance, investor bidding, secondary trading, coupon payments (if applicable), and final redemption.

The technology underpinning the pilot was built on Hyperledger Fabric, a permissioned blockchain framework known for its enterprise-grade features, privacy controls, and scalability. The system incorporated separate but integrated ledgers for the bond tokens and cash settlements. Crucially, payments were processed using wholesale central bank deposits, specifically, a tokenized version of the Canadian dollar (referred to as W-CAD) minted directly by the Bank of Canada. This allowed for near-instant, atomic settlement, where the transfer of the bond and the corresponding payment occurred simultaneously, eliminating settlement risk and dramatically reducing the time compared to conventional T+1 or T+2 cycles in traditional markets.

Project Samara built on earlier Canadian explorations of DLT in finance, such as the Bank of Canada's Jasper project from several years prior, but represented a more advanced, live issuance test. The goal was to assess whether DLT could deliver tangible improvements in operational efficiency, data integrity, transparency, and risk reduction in capital markets.

Participants reported positive outcomes in several areas. The use of DLT enhanced settlement speed and reduced counterparty risk by enabling atomic delivery-versus-payment. The immutable and shared nature of the ledger also improved data consistency and auditability across all parties. However, the pilot also highlighted important trade-offs and challenges. These included complexities in governance of the shared platform, ensuring ongoing regulatory compliance, and integrating DLT systems with existing financial infrastructure. Broader adoption, the experiment suggested, would likely face hurdles related to technology scalability, legal frameworks, and industry-wide coordination.

The Bank of Canada described the completion of Project Samara as a key step in understanding the potential of tokenization and DLT to contribute to the efficiency and security of financial instruments.

This initiative places Canada among a growing number of jurisdictions actively experimenting with tokenized assets and blockchain-based financial infrastructure. Globally, similar efforts have included the World Bank's early blockchain bond issuances (such as Bond-i in 2018), Hong Kong's tokenized green bonds starting in 2023 and expanding in subsequent years, Singapore's Project Guardian exploring digital asset tokenization, and other central bank pilots testing wholesale CBDC or DLT for settlements.

While Project Samara was limited in scope, a single short-term bond in a permissioned environment, its success demonstrates practical viability for tokenized sovereign or quasi-sovereign debt. It provides valuable insights as regulators and institutions worldwide consider how to incorporate blockchain into core financial plumbing without disrupting stability or oversight.

SO far, tokenized real-world assets (RWAs) has continued to gain traction in both public and private sectors, and experiments like Project Samara shows that even conservative central banks and established banks are increasingly open to digital innovation.

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