Slovenia announced it’s issued an inaugural digital bond, the first of any EU sovereign. It was issued as part of the European Central Bank’s (ECB) wholesale central bank money (CeBM) settlement experimentation program.
The settlement of the bond was performed on-chain in wholesale central bank digital money through the Banque de France’s (BdF) interoperable and tokenized cash solution (DL3S).
BNP Paribas acted as global coordinator and sole book runner, as well as DLT platform operator of Neobonds, BNP Paribas’ private tokenization platform built with Digital Asset’s Daml and leveraging Canton blockchain.
The Republic of Slovenia digital bond was issued with the nominal size of €30 million, coupon of 3.65% and final maturity date due 25 November 2024.
These initial transactions and experiments with wholesale tokenized central bank money represent an important steppingstone to greater transparency and efficiency of financial markets with wider technology adoption.