UK's Monument Bank to Tokenize Personal Deposits Worth £250 Million

UK-based Monument Bank is advancing plans to tokenize personal customer deposits worth up to £250 million (approximately $335 million) on a blockchain platform. This initiative stands out as it targets individual depositors directly, unlike tokenization services from global financial firms like JPMorgan and Citigroup that are primarily limited to institutional clients.

According to CoinDesk, Monument Bank will utilize the privacy-centric blockchain Midnight to tokenize deposits of up to £250 million. The tokenized deposits will pay interest similarly to traditional bank accounts and can be redeemed at a 1:1 rate in pounds, with coverage under the UK Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) maintained within applicable limits.

Mintoo Bhandari, Monument Bank's founder, stated that no previous examples exist where individual customers have directly participated in tokenization. The bank aims to design a service allowing users to interact with blockchain technology without conscious awareness, treating it as a standard deposit product.

The bank is also exploring future expansion of this infrastructure to enable personal clients to access partially owned unlisted shares, tokenized structured products, and Lombard loans.

Meanwhile, JPMorgan processes over $3 trillion in transactions via its blockchain platform Kinexys, while Citigroup supports cross-border payments worth billions daily through token services. However, these offerings remain predominantly focused on institutional clients and licensed networks.