Visa Tokenized Asset Platform Launched With Plans to Expand by 2025

Key Points:

• Visa launched the Visa Tokenized Asset Platform, allowing banks to issue fiat-backed tokens on blockchain networks using smart contract technology.
• Visa has tested VTAP with major institutions, including HSBC and BBVA, with plans for future pilots on public blockchains like Ethereum.

Visa has introduced the Visa Tokenized Asset Platform (VTAP), a new offering designed to help financial institutions issue fiat-backed tokens on blockchain networks.

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Visa Tokenized Asset Platform Launched for Issuing Fiat-Backed Tokens

Announced on Thursday, Visa Tokenized Asset Platform is available through Visa’s development platform, which allows banking partners to experiment with fiat-backed tokens in a sandbox environment.

Harnessing Visa’s expertise in smart contract technology, the platform will enable banks to issue and transfer fiat-backed tokens on blockchains. The move into the digital cash tokenization space is very timely, according to Visa head of crypto Cuy Sheffield, who says demand is growing as more physical assets like real estate and debt securities begin making their way onto blockchain networks.

Visa has been closely watching tokenization attract the most attention from central banks and its potential to introduce new modernity into financial infrastructure.

Visa Tokenized Asset Platform is purposed to enable a host of use cases, including real-time money movement between bank clients, interbank transfers in markets using wholesale Central Bank Digital Currencies, and cross-border transfers for multinational corporations.

Visa Expands Blockchain and Digital Currency Efforts

Last year, Visa teamed up with HSBC and Hang Seng Bank in a pilot program from the Hong Kong Monetary Authority’s Digital Hong Kong Dollar to test out the settling of interbank payments-including B2B transactions between merchants and financial institutions. Visa has also been selected for a CBDC pilot by the central bank of Brazil to develop a digital real.

The Spanish bank BBVA already tested the VTAP functionalities this year, including the issuance and transfer of bank tokens on a testnet blockchain. BBVA has plans to go live with a pilot for select customers on the Ethereum blockchain in 2025.

Visa is by no means a stranger to blockchain. In 2021, it began to process cryptocurrency payments in the form of stablecoin USDC on the Ethereum network. The company also still works with Brazil’s central bank on its ongoing CBDC project.