R3’s enterprise distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform Corda has supported the first live issuance of a digital bond with Euroclear’s International Central Securities Depository (ICSD).
The SSA (supranational, sovereign and agency) bond was issued by the World Bank, with Citi – an R3 investor – acting as issuer agent and TD Securities acting as dealer. The issuance took place under UK law and was successfully completed 23 October at 1pm BST.
David Rutter, CEO and Founder of R3, said, “This issuance is not a sandbox or proof of concept project – it is a live market issuance and it demonstrates the role DLT can play in transforming capital markets. Financial Market Infrastructures (FMIs) such as Euroclear play a critical role in the financial ecosystem. We’re working with them and central banks in areas such as securities settlement to improve how we communicate and exchange value, ultimately to deliver a better, more efficient, open, trusted and enduring digital economy. This is about bringing participants and ecosystems together to modernise mission-critical processes in the capital markets industry.”
R3 said the use of Corda’s distributed architecture demonstrated the capabilities of the platform to support the issuance and primary distribution part of the lifecycle of a bond under the existing legal framework applicable to an ICSD.
Euroclear’s chief digital officer, Antonio Queiroz, said, “Through working with our extensive global ecosystem, we have achieved a major milestone in both our DFMI initiative and the evolution of securities trading as a whole.”
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