# Citi, Swift and DTCC Identify Interoperability as a Digital Finance Hurdle

By Simon Yoon

Canonical URL: https://www.tokenpost.com/news/technology/45358
Published: 2026-10-31T06:31:25.000Z
Updated: 2026-10-31T06:31:25.000Z
Section: Technology

> A Sept. 23 framework examines how institutions can connect networks with different standards and settlement assets. Two EU pilot venues lacked live links to traditional market systems in 2025.

Citi, Swift and the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) published a Sept. 23 framework for digital finance that identifies interoperability across networks as a hurdle for institutional-scale tokenized markets.

The paper examines the operational work of moving assets between systems with different standards and settlement assets. Ryan Rugg, Citi Services’ Global Head of Blockchain Strategy and DLT Implementation, called separate wallets, keys, nodes and digital-asset accounting “too complex for immediate widespread adoption.”

Interoperability extends beyond a software connection: institutions need shared processes to move securities across platforms and coordinate transactions.

The European Union (EU) had three authorized distributed-ledger technology (DLT) market infrastructures as of May 31, 2025: two operational and one pre-operational. The two operating venues, CSD Prague and 21X AG, lacked live links to traditional central securities depositories, central counterparties and the TARGET2 payment system, and neither had access to central bank money settlement.

Live trading activity at the venues was minimal, alongside issuance and settlement activity. CSD Prague had six share issues and one debt securities issue; 21X AG had one debt securities issue.

In the United States, the Depository Trust Company (DTC), a DTCC subsidiary, launched its Tokenization Service Oct. 28, supporting tokenized representations of assets held at DTC on Canton Network and DTCC’s private Besu network. DTCC plans to add networks in 2027.

A shared platform for tokenized money and securities is one proposed way to reduce settlement risks and costs. Atomic settlement, which exchanges an asset and its payment at the same time, can raise liquidity demands and make liquidity-saving mechanisms part of the design.