Canada's six biggest banks explore a shared tokenized deposit system, with no launch date or network named

Canada's six largest banks said Tuesday they are jointly exploring a Canadian-dollar tokenized deposit system, a digital form of ordinary bank deposits that could move between institutions faster and be programmed to pay on set conditions. The participants are Bank of Montreal, CIBC, National Bank of Canada, Royal Bank of Canada, Scotiabank and TD, according to the joint release TD issued. CoinDesk first reported the details for crypto readers.

The first phase aims to move tokenized deposits between Canadian financial institutions. The longer-term goal, the banks said, is to connect with "other emerging digital assets initiatives." They expect other deposit-taking institutions to join "at the appropriate time."

What the release does not say

Several headlines describe the banks as launching a system. The release itself is more cautious, and it is short. It does not give:

• A launch date or any timeline for the first phase.
• A technology choice. No blockchain, public or private, is named.
• A budget, governance structure or operator.
• A commitment to issue anything. CoinDesk makes the same point: the project does not yet commit the lenders to issuing a tokenized deposit.

What it does establish is that the banks that dominate Canadian deposits have agreed to work on one common model instead of six separate ones.

Why banks prefer this to stablecoins

A tokenized deposit is still a bank deposit: the money stays on the bank's balance sheet, under bank regulation, and can keep funding loans. A stablecoin is a separate token issued by another company, backed by reserves that may or may not sit at a bank. That is the difference the Canadian release points to when it stresses "safety, stability, and effective regulatory oversight."

The concern is live on the other side of the Atlantic too. This week European central banks asked for the rule requiring stablecoin issuers to hold up to 60% of reserves as bank deposits to be dropped, arguing those deposits are unstable funding for banks, as we reported. Tokenized deposits are the banks' answer to that problem: keep the customer's digital dollars inside the banking system.

Where Canada already stands

According to CoinDesk, the Bank of Canada, RBC and TD completed Project Samara in March, issuing, trading and settling a C$100 million bond on a distributed ledger. In May, Shopify and National Bank of Canada backed a regulated digital Canadian dollar. In the U.S., CoinDesk notes, regional lenders are building a shared tokenized-deposit network while JPMorgan, Citi and Wells Fargo run their own institutional products.

For businesses, nothing changes yet. If the project reaches customers, the practical gain would be around-the-clock, programmable payments between Canadian banks, which matters most to firms that settle large cross-bank transfers or pay suppliers outside business hours. For live token prices, see our crypto prices page.

Sources: TD Bank Group joint release, CoinDesk. This is market information, not investment advice.