The European Central Bank, European Commission and European Securities and Markets Authority are seeking nominations for an industry-led group to develop common standards for holding and settling tokenized securities, according to a release published Monday, Nov. 9, 2026.
Eligible applicants—including EU industry associations, global institutions, private firms and fintech companies—can apply to the European Tokenisation Standards Group (ETSG) by Nov. 27, 2026. Work is scheduled to begin in January 2027, with an initial set of standards targeted for early 2028. The three EU institutions will participate as observers.
Connecting tokenized markets
The group will develop technical and market standards intended to help companies hold and settle tokenized securities across different distributed ledger technology (DLT) platforms. Its work will also address how those platforms connect with existing financial systems.
The standards are intended to support Appia, the Eurosystem’s initiative to develop a blueprint for Europe’s tokenized financial markets. The institutions warned that fragmentation could limit tokenization’s benefits. Under its mandate, the group may recommend ways for EU authorities to encourage firms to adopt its standards; the announcement does not establish a binding rule.
The initiative follows the Eurosystem’s September 2026 launch of Pontes, a system that allows financial institutions to settle wholesale transactions in tokenized assets using central bank money.
Original source: Cointelegraph, published Nov. 9, 2026, at 20:27:06 UTC+08:00.