DBS and Citi Complete First Weekend Tokenized USD Payment
DBS and Citi completed a live weekend USD payment between Singapore and the U.S. in minutes using tokenized deposits via Swift’s Digital Ledger.
DBS and Citi have completed what they describe as the first successful weekend USD payment between Singapore and the United States, demonstrating how tokenized bank deposits could help cross-border payments operate beyond traditional banking hours.
The live transaction was carried out on September 5 between DBS and Citi’s New York office using tokenized deposits through Swift’s Digital Ledger. According to DBS, the transfer took minutes, compared with an industry norm of up to two business days for conventional cross-border payments.
Tokenized Deposits Enable Weekend Settlement
Cross-border transfers can face delays when banking hours, weekends and time-zone differences overlap. By processing the transaction on a Saturday, DBS and Citi showed that regulated bank deposits can potentially move across jurisdictions without those traditional operating-hour constraints.
The capability could be particularly relevant for companies in always-on industries such as e-commerce and digital services, where delayed settlement can affect access to working capital. It could also allow corporate treasury teams to move liquidity between entities and markets more quickly as conditions change.
Rachel Chew, Group Chief Operating Officer and Co-Head of Digital Assets at DBS Global Transaction Services, said the transaction illustrates a broader shift in how tokenized money is being used.
“We are pleased to be working with Citi to demonstrate how tokenised money is moving from experimentation to real-world adoption – laying the foundations for a more connected, nimble and always-on global financial system.”
Swift plays an important role in the initiative by providing an interoperability layer between existing banking infrastructure and emerging digital networks rather than requiring institutions to operate entirely within a proprietary system.
What Is a Tokenized Deposit?
A tokenized deposit is a digital representation of funds held in a commercial bank account, recorded and transferred through distributed-ledger technology.
Although it can move across digital infrastructure similarly to other tokenized assets, it differs from a stablecoin in an important way: the deposit remains a direct claim on the issuing bank and part of the regulated banking system.
Tokenization can add features such as programmability and round-the-clock transferability while preserving the established relationship between a bank and its customer. In the DBS-Citi transaction, that model allowed a live USD payment to settle between Singapore and the U.S. during the weekend.
Banks Expand Tokenized Payment Infrastructure
The transaction follows a broader push by both institutions into tokenized finance.
Citi joined a Swift pilot for 24/7 cross-border payments using tokenized deposits in July, and the bank has previously said its infrastructure can support near-instantaneous movement of tokenized deposits across select markets.
Citi is also participating in an initiative involving major U.S. banks to develop a tokenized deposit network through The Clearing House. The network is targeting a launch in the first half of 2027 and is intended to support instant and around-the-clock settlement.
DBS has meanwhile been building its own institutional tokenization infrastructure. In 2024, it introduced DBS Token Services, a suite of services designed to support programmable and continuous value transfers.
The offering includes DBS Treasury Tokens, a treasury and liquidity management solution running on the bank’s permissioned blockchain. DBS is also the only Asian-headquartered bank among the 12 institutions in Swift’s digital ledger core design group, which is helping shape the system’s architecture.
Tokenized Bank Money Moves Beyond Pilots
The significance of the DBS-Citi transaction lies less in the size of a single payment than in the infrastructure used to complete it. Instead of demonstrating tokenized deposits only in a controlled pilot, the banks processed a live cross-border USD transaction over a weekend in minutes.
It also highlights how banks are approaching tokenization without necessarily replacing conventional deposits with cryptocurrencies or stablecoins. Regulated commercial bank money can instead be connected to distributed-ledger infrastructure while remaining within the existing banking framework.
With Swift providing interoperability between institutions, the model could potentially extend beyond isolated bank networks. The DBS-Citi payment therefore represents another practical step toward 24/7 institutional settlement, where the distinction between traditional banking hours and always-on digital financial infrastructure becomes increasingly less important.
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