Bank of England Taps Trio for Digital Pound Interoperability Experiment

The Bank of England's Digital Pound Lab has selected three participants to pilot SME credit data in its second phase: NOBO Finance, Dun & Bradstreet, and Polygon Labs. The consortium will test how stablecoins and a potential digital pound can interoperate to improve cross-border trade finance.

The project aims to tackle the financing gap created by slow settlement and limited credit access for cross-border SMEs. Manual verification and fragmented financial data can make it difficult for smaller businesses to prove their creditworthiness, while waiting for international payments can tie up vital working capital.

Phase 2 will explore whether portable, verifiable financial identities and faster digital settlement can make cross-border SME financing more efficient. The consortium will develop two main workstreams: the SME Bankable Profile, led by NOBO with Dun & Bradstreet and Polygon Labs, and eBL-backed invoice factoring with multi-rail settlement.

The goal of the project is to create a portable financial identity that SMEs can use across different lenders and markets. The consortium believes that this will help establish trust between trading partners and financial institutions, making SMEs more visible and bankable within cross-border trade.