SWIFT plans to trial live transactions of tokenized assets and cryptocurrencies in 2025

SWIFT, a global bank messaging network that was used for processing transactions for decades, recently revealed plans to trial live transactions of digital currencies and tokenized assets.

SWIFT Crypto Trials To Start In 2025

According to SWIFT, the trials are scheduled to start at some point in 2025. The new move represents the latest step in a slow-moving integration of cryptos and digital assets in the wider financial system.

SWIFT’s decision to finally make its own move toward testing and potentially adopting cryptocurrencies comes after banks and financial managers already spent years doing the same. Asset tokenization was also a very interesting concept for financial institutions, who saw plenty of valuable use cases that crypto technologies could offer to their own businesses.

Specifically, they expect that using digital units — tokens that represent shares of underlying assets — would make trading faster, cheaper, and overall more efficient. That also includes removing the middlemen that are typically involved at every step of conducting transactions, especially on an international level.

Unfortunately, so far, tokenized assets have failed to gain substantial traction in the wider market. Meanwhile, about 90% of central banks around the world have started testing central bank digital currencies instead — their own digital versions of fiat money, that facilitate trading of tokenized assets.

Along the way, financial authorities are trying to get on top of all the technological advances in both crypto and traditional finance, especially when it comes to advances that have enabled cryptos such as Bitcoin.

SWIFT Continues To Work On Integrating Cryptos and Tokenized Assets

Going back to SWIFT, the messaging network has played a crucial role in global banking for years, and while many were saying that it is becoming obsolete, SWIFT made some improvements over the last few years. However, with the crypto popularity and usage strengthening rather than fading away, SWIFT started engaging in trials of both CBDCs and tokenized assets.

Earlier this year, in March, it said that it intends to launch a new platform that would connect the CBDCs that are currently still in development and the existing financial system. SWIFT’s head of innovation, Nick Kerigan, stated: “Now we see industry demand to move out of that (trial) phase and see a digital asset really move, and have a counterparty pay them in real money against that.”

He said that the company will be moving onto the next stage in 2025, but it will be in a safe, controlled way. 

SWIFT recognizes that this technology has massive potential, but at the same time, the market’s nature remains fragmented, and that is holding it back. As a result, there have been very few initiatives that managed to progress enough to leave the banks’ own internal systems.