The European Central Bank has launched Pontes, its new infrastructure for settling tokenized securities in central bank money, with an XRPL-linked platform among the first four DLT operators connected to the system.
The Eurosystem confirmed that Pontes went live on Sept. 21 with Axiology, Clearstream, Cashlink and SWIAT among its initial DLT operators. Banks including Deutsche Bank, Santander, Société Générale and the European Investment Bank have also completed onboarding.
For XRP investors, however, there is an important distinction: the ECB is not using XRP or the public XRP Ledger.
Axiology Uses XRPL Code, Not the Public Ledger
Axiology operates a private, permissioned blockchain built using the open-source code of the XRP Ledger.
The company explicitly says its infrastructure operates independently from both Ripple and the public XRPL. Only authorized financial institutions can operate nodes on the network.
That makes the development significant for XRPL technology adoption, but it does not mean tokenized European securities are settling in XRP.
Pontes instead connects participating DLT platforms with the Eurosystem's TARGET infrastructure so transactions can settle using central bank money.
The distinction matters because XRPL's institutional footprint has already been expanding in other areas. Institutions have used the ledger for tokenized Treasury settlement involving Mastercard, Ondo and JPMorgan, while tokenized real-world assets have become an increasingly important part of the network's growth story.
ECB Takes Tokenization One Step Further
The ECB also announced that it is preparing to invest a small portion of its own funds in tokenized securities, with those transactions eventually settling through Pontes. Initial purchases are expected to focus on euro-denominated public-sector and supranational securities.
That gives the launch a broader significance beyond Axiology.
The ECB is moving from experiments toward live tokenized market infrastructure, while XRPL-derived technology has secured a place among the systems connecting to it.
Coinpaper has already tracked how XRPL tokenization expanded into billions of dollars of real-world assets and how the network is being developed for institutional-grade lending and credit.