The European Central Bank launched Pontes on 21 September to settle wholesale distributed-ledger transactions in central-bank money. The service connects eligible market DLT platforms to the Eurosystem’s TARGET Services. Financial Times reporting said 13 banks, including Deutsche Bank and Santander, joined the initial phase alongside four technology partners.
Pontes is the short-term element of the Eurosystem’s strategy for settling transactions recorded on distributed ledgers. It builds on earlier exploratory work and provides an operational bridge to existing TARGET infrastructure. The project is separate from the proposed digital euro for retail payments and is aimed at financial-market transactions.
LINKING DLT TO TARGET SERVICES
The ECB said Pontes can settle eligible DLT transactions through two routes. One uses central-bank-money cash tokens issued on a Eurosystem DLT platform, while the other triggers ordinary payments through the T2 real-time gross-settlement system. In both cases, the cash leg receives settlement finality in T2.
The design allows market platforms to retain their own distributed ledgers while connecting the cash side to central-bank infrastructure. That reduces the need for each platform to create a separate commercial settlement asset. It also gives participating institutions a route to use tokenised workflows without replacing the legal finality and liquidity arrangements of TARGET Services.
FROM PILOT TO BROADER OPERATION
The initial group brings regulated banks and market-infrastructure technology providers into a live wholesale settlement environment. Participation does not by itself establish that DLT will replace conventional securities infrastructure, but it moves the Eurosystem’s work from experimentation into operation. The launch creates a practical test of interoperability, liquidity management and operational resilience across participating platforms.
The next milestone is the service’s planned expansion, with the Financial Times reporting that round-the-clock operation is targeted by 2028. Banks and market operators will watch how quickly transaction volumes, eligible assets and connected platforms grow. The longer-term test will be whether Pontes can scale while maintaining T2 finality, resilience and regulatory safeguards.