Ant International completes Hong Kong interbank transfers in five minutes using tokenised deposits
Key Facts
Ant International said it completed a series of live Hong Kong dollar transfers between Hong Kong banks during September and October 2026, with funds reaching the final beneficiary within five minutes. The company said the transfers used tokenised deposits settled with central bank money, in transactions involving Bank of China (Hong Kong), China Construction Bank (Asia) and HSBC. The announcement marks a practical test of transferring liquidity between banks using tokenised central bank money, as the Hong Kong Monetary Authority expands the settlement available for these transactions. Ant International announced the results on 3 November, while the Monetary Authority’s announcement on expanding settlement capacity came the previous day. The company said the transfers went from payment instruction to final receipt within five minutes.
The series covered three types of transactions: transfers between Bank of China (Hong Kong) and China Construction Bank (Asia), transactions between China Construction Bank (Asia) banks, and HSBC transactions. The transfers were initiated through Ant International’s blockchain-based Whale RTB wholesale settlement platform. The company said automated execution enabled access to liquidity around the clock and reduced its reliance on pre-funding to move liquidity. This allows transfers across banks to be managed outside regular operating schedules, according to the company’s description of the trial. The announcement did not specify the amount of money transferred or the value of the transactions.
The role of tokenised deposits differs from that of the central bank money used for settlement: the transfers involved digitally represented bank deposits, while final settlement was conducted using tokenised central bank money, according to Ant International’s announcement. On 2 November, the Monetary Authority said EnsembleTX supports round-the-clock settlement of interbank tokenised-deposit transactions using tokenised central bank money. The number of participants in the project had risen to 12 banks and 20 leading industry entities, according to the Authority. This structure gives banks a shared mechanism for settling tokenised-deposit transfers, while round-the-clock continuity allows them to be carried out outside traditional settlement hours. The Monetary Authority describes the expansion as an enhancement of settlement capacity within EnsembleTX, while Ant International announced specific transactions it had conducted with the banks.
EnsembleTX was launched in November 2025 and initially used the Hong Kong dollar real-time gross settlement system to settle interbank tokenised-deposit transactions. The Monetary Authority said live-value trials included corporate treasury management and transactions involving tokenised money market funds. The shift from the real-time settlement system to support for round-the-clock settlement using tokenised central bank money expands the available operating infrastructure, according to the Authority’s announcement. In November 2025, CCB (Asia) said it had completed validation of live-value tokenised-deposit transactions, including interbank transfers and delivery-versus-payment settlement. The bank added at the time that the validation laid the groundwork for future commercial applications, broader uses of tokenisation and improved infrastructure interoperability.
The Monetary Authority said the project had moved over two years from experimentation and testing to a phase focused on advancing the commercialisation of tokenisation applications in Hong Kong. It said the expanded capacity aims to facilitate higher transaction volumes and explore additional use cases, while continuing to work with the Securities and Futures Commission on the supporting environment and infrastructure. The Commission’s chief executive, Julia Leung, said round-the-clock settlement could support corporate treasury management and secondary trading of tokenised funds on licensed platforms. Ant International had participated in the Ensemble sandbox since 2024, then joined the project’s infrastructure community in 2025. The Monetary Authority intends to continue coordinating with the Commission to develop a tokenised financial ecosystem and related market infrastructure.