BIS Launches Live Trials for Project Agorá Blockchain Payment Network With 5 Central Banks and Global Financial Firms

According to Bloomberg, on May 27, the Bank for International Settlements launched live transaction trials for Project Agorá, a blockchain-based initiative designed to improve cross-border payment systems. The project is transitioning from simulations to real-value transactions involving participating central banks and financial institutions.

Participating central banks include the Bank of Korea, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, European Central Bank, Bank of Japan, and Bank of England. Private-sector participants include JPMorgan, UBS, Visa, Mastercard, and South Korean commercial banks KB Kookmin Bank, Shinhan Bank, and Hana Bank. Project Agorá aims to create a unified ledger for tokenizing central bank reserves and commercial bank deposits, enabling atomic settlement where both sides of a transaction complete simultaneously, reducing settlement risk and operational inefficiencies in international payments.