Swiss bank UBS has successfully piloted a new system called UBS Digital Cash which, leveraging blockchain technology, is designed to simplify intraday-liquidity management for clients making cross-border payments.

The system enables the settlement of international transactions using smart contracts on a private blockchain network.

UBS says that the pilot facilitated “domestic transactions within Switzerland and cross-border payments in US dollars, Swiss francs, Euros and Chinese yuan”.

Having tested the system among multinational clients and banks, UBS adds that it now intends to “expand and develop its UBS Digital Cash offering in further steps”.

Although the bank has not disclosed what these further steps are, Xiaonan Zou, its head of digital assets and group treasury, cites the combination of UBS Digital Cash with “other digital cash initiatives” as “key for the financial industry”.

“In addition to their role in correspondent banking, they also have the potential to streamline and simplify the settlement of tokenised assets in the capital market,” she explains.

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