The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), the premier post-trade market infrastructure for the global financial services industry, alongside Digital Asset Holdings (Digital Asset) and the Canton Network, announced a new partnership to enable the tokenization of The Depository Trust Company (DTC)-custodied assets on the Canton Network.

The partnership reflects Digital Asset’s and DTCC’s mutual commitment to pioneering digital transformation across capital markets. The partnership announcement follows DTC’s recent receipt of a No-Action Letter from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to implement and operate a new service to tokenize real-world, DTC-custodied assets.

With this partnership, DTCC plans, for the first time, to enable a subset of U.S. Treasury securities custodied at DTC to be minted on the Canton Network. The organizations are working towards an MVP in a controlled production environment during the first half of 2026, with plans to increase the size and scope of the project in the months that follow based upon client interest. DTCC will leverage its ComposerX suite of platforms to enable the tokenization of U.S. Treasury securities custodied at DTC.

“DTCC’s partnership with Digital Asset and the Canton Network is a strategic step forward as we collaborate across the industry to build a digital infrastructure that seamlessly bridges the traditional and digital financial ecosystems and provides unmatched scalability and safety,” said Frank La Salla, CEO of DTCC. “This collaboration creates a roadmap to bring real-world, high-value tokenization use cases to market, starting with U.S. Treasury securities and eventually expanding to a broad spectrum of DTC-eligible assets across network providers.”

“This partnership reflects the collective ambition of leading market participants to create future-proof, interoperable financial ecosystems,” said Yuval Rooz, Co-Founder and CEO of Digital Asset. “DTCC’s leadership in this space not only accelerates industry adoption but establishes a foundation for meaningful innovation, unlocking new liquidity opportunities, products, and operational improvements.”

While the full DTCC, Digital Asset and Canton Network partnership roadmap is anticipated to unfold over multiple years, the first phase aims to deliver tangible benefits to market participants by providing access to digitized financial instruments in a secure and regulated environment. This phased approach helps ensure flexibility and adaptability, allowing participants to adopt decentralized technologies while meeting regulatory requirements.

“Our goal is to enable the industry and DTC Participants to take advantage of tokenization capabilities that enhance liquidity, operational efficiency and market transparency. We welcome the opportunity to partner with Digital Asset and the Canton Network to bring this first, production environment activity live,” stated Brian Steele, Managing Director, President, Clearing & Securities Services at DTCC. “This effort builds upon DTCC’s prior collateral mobility experiment and is part of the firm’s broader strategy to advance a secure, transparent and interoperable digital asset ecosystem that leverages the full potential of blockchain technology across network providers while ensuring the resiliency and safety of traditional markets.”

It is anticipated that adoption of tokenized securities could generate significant operational and financial efficiencies across market participants, including major market makers and hedge funds. The ability to streamline processes, reduce operational risk, and enhance capital efficiency is also anticipated to create a positive impact on balance sheets.

In addition to the tokenization initiative, DTCC will assume a leadership position within the Canton Network’s decentralized governance structure, joining the Canton Foundation as co-chair alongside Euroclear. This new role will enable DTCC to actively participate in setting industry-wide standards for decentralized financial infrastructure.

Source: DTCC