The Bank of Canada (BoC), RBC Capital Markets, RBC Investor Services, TD Bank Group (TD), and Export Development Canada (EDC) successfully completed Project Samara, a collaborative initiative to evaluate how tokenization and distributed ledger technology (DLT) can improve bond issuance and settlement in a real-world setting.

As a key milestone in the experiment, EDC issued this week Canada’s first tokenized bond using DLT, with payments settled in wholesale central bank deposits. The bond was sold and traded and will be managed throughout its life cycle on the Samara Platform.

The Samara Platform was designed for the experiment to support end-to-end transactions throughout the bond’s life cycle—including cash and bond issuance, bidding, coupon payment, redemption and secondary trading—on DLT infrastructure. Built on Hyperledger Fabric, the platform integrates separate bond and cash ledgers and enables the transaction to be settled instantly, as well as secondary market trading and settlement of the tokenized bond, directly on-chain.

Building on earlier experimental work from the series of Jasper projects, Samara tested the real-world feasibility and implications of a DLT-based platform for capital markets, using a real bond funded and traded with central bank money. The project was structured as a limited experiment, involving the issuance of a single security—a $100 million Canadian dollar–denominated bond of less than 3 months—to a closed investor group.

The experiment revealed both the potential and the limitations of DLT in a real-world financial setting:

• Efficiency gains: across participants, both operational efficiency and data integrity were improved, and workflows were streamlined
• Operational and governance complexity: efficiency gains were partially offset by system complexity, liquidity costs, the need for new governance structures, and increased attention in coordination, reporting and oversight
• Risk management: counterparty and settlement risk were reduced, but new operational risks related to technology, auditability and fallback mechanisms were introduced
• Regulatory and legal considerations: some centralized roles (such as a marketplace operator, custodian and off-platform trade reporting) highlighted gaps between the current regulatory framework and DLT principles
• Adoption barriers: despite technical feasibility, broader adoption will likely be slow due to several factors, such as integration challenges and limited appetite for core infrastructure changes.

Overall, Project Samara generated valuable insights into the practical application of DLT in capital markets. These insights provide a foundation for future work, and, while impacts in the short term are uncertain, the technology appears well-positioned to deliver efficiency and resilience benefits over the long term. Comprehensive findings of the project can be found in the Project Samara Research Paper.

Ron Morrow, Executive Director, Payments, Supervision and Oversight, Bank of Canada
“Project Samara shows how the public sector and industry can work together to harness innovation in the payment ecosystem. The Project allowed us to understand the real-world benefits and challenges of tokenization in capital markets. The Bank welcomes further collaboration in this fast-developing area and will continue to play a role as enabler of innovation in payments that serve Canadians.”

Scott Moore, Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Operating Officer, EDC
“Issuing Canada’s first tokenized bond is an exciting milestone for EDC and Canada. As Canada’s export credit agency and an institution active in international capital markets, EDC is proud to contribute to this innovation alongside trusted partners. The execution of Project Samara marks an important step in deepening our understanding of tokenization and distributed ledger technology and how it can contribute to the efficiency and security of financial instruments to better serve investors, businesses and the financial community.”

Jim Byrd, Global Head of Macro Products, RBC Capital Markets
“The success of Samara underscores the art of the possible. This group worked together to advance innovation – achieving real-time settlement and reimagining how issuers and investors can interact with fixed-income markets. Beyond the technical achievement, we’ve strengthened our understanding of how distributed ledger technology can be applied across capital markets – from issuance to secondary trading and settlement. We are using these insights to explore how these capabilities can evolve what we offer to our clients.”

Elizabeth St-Onge, Managing Director, Head of Digital Assets Product & Strategy at TD Securities
“TD is proud to serve as Joint Lead Manager on Project Samara and to support the issuance of Canada’s first tokenized bond. Projects like this give us insights that help advance innovation in capital markets and the broader financial system, as well as support market infrastructure that serves issuers and investors.”

Source: Bank of Canada