ECB's Pontes Solution for DLT Transactions Set to Launch in September Amid Calls for Harmonized Securities Law
European Central Bank (ECB) Executive Board member Piero Cipollone emphasized the importance of harmonized securities law in a recent speech at a Bundesbank symposium.
Cipollone confirmed that the ECB's Pontes solution for settling Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) transactions in central bank money is set to launch in September, with initial users paying only one-time onboarding fees to encourage adoption.
The real message of Cipollone's speech, however, concerned law rather than technology. He argued that tokenization could reorganize the entire financial value chain, settling cash and asset legs atomically while smart contracts handle coupon payments, collateral movements, and compliance checks.
Cipollone identified three risks associated with this new approach: fragmentation across incompatible platforms, loss of the central bank money anchor if markets settle in private assets, and dependence on infrastructure or technology controlled outside Europe.