Singapore, Canadian Central Banks Unite on Blockchain Cross-Border Payments

Singapore’s central bank has announced a slew of initiatives during the ongoing FinTech Festival, including a notable partnership with the Bank of Canada on cross-border payments using blockchain.

On the second day of the week-long Singapore FinTech Festival today, Ravi Menon, director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Singapore’s central bank and financial regulator, spoke at length about Project Ubin – the central bank’s effort to place a process currently reliant on intermediaries that could take days to settle. Project Ubin, the central banker said, uses blockchain technology to enable central banks to make direct payments without intermediaries at near-instant speeds and minimal risks.

Earlier this year, Phase 1 of Project Ubin successfully trialed a digital Singapore dollar on a private Ethereum blockchain. Phase 2 saw the development of three software models enabling decentralized interbank payment and settlements with liquidity savings while preserving transactional privacy.

Now, Singapore’s central bank is expanding its Project Ubin program beyond Singapore to establish a partnership with its counterpart in Canada