BMO Expands Tokenized Cash Infrastructure

BMO, a North American commercial bank focused on payments, announced a joint project with CME Group, a global derivatives marketplace operator, and Google Cloud, a cloud infrastructure and data services provider. The partners plan to launch tokenized cash and deposit capabilities for institutional clients using a permissioned network based on Google Cloud Universal Ledger.

The platform is designed to support continuous financial operations. Clients will be able to convert U.S. dollars into tokenized cash and deposits at any time, without traditional banking cutoffs. The system targets use in margin requirements, trading flows, and settlement between market participants.

The tokenized cash instrument will be available to mutual clients of BMO and CME Group, subject to regulatory approval expected in the second half of 2026. It is intended for regulated firms operating in capital markets. In parallel, tokenized deposits will extend access to digital representations of bank funds for broader corporate use, including treasury management and B2B payments.

The initiative builds on earlier work by CME Group and Google Cloud, which in 2025 began testing tokenization and wholesale payment solutions on GCUL. The ledger is structured as a private distributed system that simplifies asset management and enables secure transfers between approved participants.

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