Tokenisation promises faster, programmable and potentially more efficient payments. Yet the real test is not whether new forms of money use advanced technology, but whether they preserve the qualities that allow people and businesses to trust the monetary system.

Speaking at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium on 28 August 2026, BIS General Manager Pablo Hernández de Cos compared stablecoins with tokenised bank deposits and argued that innovation should strengthen, rather than weaken, the foundations of money.

Why Trust Still Matters

Modern monetary systems depend on a common unit of account and the “singleness of money”. In practical terms, different forms of money denominated in the same currency should be exchangeable at par and ultimately redeemable into central bank money.

This means people do not have to assess the reliability of every payment instrument before accepting it. Central bank money provides the anchor, while supervised commercial banks supply most of the money used by households and businesses.

Tokenisation could reduce some existing frictions by making assets and claims programmable and enabling more efficient settlement. However, technology alone cannot guarantee monetary stability.

Stablecoins Face Gaps

Stablecoins are digital tokens designed to track the value of conventional currencies. Their structure, however, can challenge the principle that money should exchange at par.

Hernández de Cos used USDT and USDC as an example. A person holding one stablecoin may need to sell it before buying another, and market prices can deviate from their intended value, particularly during financial stress. There is no system-wide mechanism guaranteeing that different stablecoins will always exchange one-for-one.

Interoperability presents another difficulty. Many fiat-linked stablecoins operate across public blockchains and scaling networks. Even identical tokens on different chains may require bridges or other mechanisms to move between them, introducing additional costs and risks.

Financial integrity is another concern. Much stablecoin activity takes place through self-custodied wallets, while an increasing proportion of transfers occurs directly between wallets outside platforms applying standard know-your-customer checks.

Tokenised Deposits Differ

Tokenised deposits remain liabilities of regulated commercial banks, but are recorded and transferred through programmable platforms.

In this model, payments can still be settled between banks using central bank money. This maintains the connection between commercial bank deposits and the monetary anchor while allowing new technological features.

The approach is not without problems. Existing tokenised-deposit platforms are not yet genuinely interoperable, and no broad multi-bank, cross-border ecosystem currently operates at scale. Separate systems could become isolated “walled gardens”, while smaller banks may face significant implementation costs.

Around-the-clock transactions could also allow deposits to move more rapidly during periods of financial stress.

Stablecoins Could Affect Credit

Widespread stablecoin use could also influence bank funding and lending, depending on how issuers invest their reserves.

If reserves are held mainly as wholesale bank deposits, banks could become more dependent on concentrated and interest-sensitive funding. If issuers instead buy short-term government securities or hold central bank reserves, funds could move away from traditional bank deposits.

BIS modelling suggests that the overall effect on economic output may be modest, although the impact could differ substantially across institutions. Smaller banks could face greater pressure, potentially affecting lending to small businesses.

Stablecoin issuers may also remain vulnerable to runs. Sudden withdrawals could force asset sales or remove large deposits from banks, transmitting stress into wider financial markets.

A Mixed Digital Future

The BIS analysis does not assume that one technology must eliminate the other. Hernández de Cos suggested that tokenised deposits and stablecoins could coexist if their roles and safeguards were clearly defined.

Tokenised deposits could support much of everyday and wholesale payment activity while remaining anchored in central bank money. Stablecoins could continue to serve more specialised purposes, including decentralised financial applications, but would require robust rules covering redemption, reserves, liquidity, governance and financial integrity.

Project Agorá already provides an example of experimentation in this direction, testing wholesale cross-border payments in which tokenised commercial bank money can settle across currencies while preserving domestic oversight.

The wider message is straightforward: the next generation of money may depend less on replacing the existing system than on modernising it. Programmability, atomic settlement and continuous operation could bring genuine benefits, but their value will ultimately depend on whether innovation preserves the trust that makes money useful in the first place.