RBA: Asset and Money Tokenization Could Generate AUD 24 Billion for Australia

The Reserve Bank of Australia estimates that tokenizing assets and money could generate approximately AUD 24 billion per year for the Australian economy, marking a decisive shift in the central bank’s stance from exploring whether tokenization has a future to actively planning how to implement it.

RBA Assistant Governor Brad Jones delivered the figure in a speech titled “After Acacia: The Next Era of Financial System Innovation?” on March 25, 2026. The AUD 24 billion estimate comes from research by the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre (DFCRC), and Jones noted the actual gains could be “larger still if new markets emerged and second round effects are included.”

The projection is not speculative theory. It stems from Project Acacia, a joint RBA-DFCRC initiative launched in November 2024 that tested roughly 20 to 24 use cases involving real money and real asset transactions across multiple blockchain platforms.

RBA Puts a Number on Tokenization: What the AUD 24 Billion Covers

The DFCRC research quantified efficiency gains from tokenizing a broad range of financial instruments. Project Acacia tested government and corporate bonds, repurchase agreements, term deposits, investment funds, mining royalties, and trade payables.

Settlement assets tested included stablecoins, bank deposit tokens, a pilot wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC), and Exchange Settlement Account (ESA) balances. The trials ran across four blockchain platforms: Hedera, Redbelly Network, R3 Corda, and EVM-compatible networks.

Three of Australia’s Big Four banks participated directly: Commonwealth Bank, ANZ, and Westpac. Only National Australia Bank was absent from the initiative.

The core value proposition centers on eliminating friction in settlement and collateral management. Current securities settlement in Australia typically operates on a T+2 cycle, meaning two business days between trade execution and final settlement. Tokenized settlement can compress this to near-instantaneous, freeing up capital that would otherwise be locked during the waiting period.

One notable finding: wholesale CBDC was deemed “far from essential” in the near term. Industry participants leaned toward stablecoins and bank deposit tokens as preferred settlement assets, with synchronization bridges between ledgers considered viable with existing technology.

From “Whether” to “How”: The RBA’s Policy Pivot

“We no longer see the main question as whether tokenisation has a future in Australia’s financial system, but rather, how,” Jones said in the speech. That single sentence captures a meaningful shift in institutional posture.

Jones also stated: “We have now seen enough to warrant intensified focus on how some of the potential benefits might be realised, consistent with system-wide stability.”

Despite the optimism, Jones identified three systemic barriers standing in the way: entrenched network effects in existing financial infrastructure, regulatory uncertainty driving risk aversion among potential adopters, and coordination failures across market participants.

To address these, the RBA outlined concrete next steps. These include establishing a digital financial market infrastructure (DFMI) sandbox in partnership with the DFCRC, reviewing central bank account access policies, expanding cross-border payment capabilities, forming a Regulator-Industry Tokenisation Advisory Group, and convening a C-suite Roundtable on Digital Finance.

Australia’s securities regulator, ASIC, has already provided regulatory relief specifically to enable the Project Acacia research, suggesting institutional coordination is already underway.

Australia’s Position in the Global Tokenization Race

The RBA’s announcement lands amid accelerating institutional tokenization activity worldwide. In the United States, the SEC approved Nasdaq’s plan to settle Russell 1000 stocks as tokenized securities. The NYSE signed a memorandum of understanding with Securitize, naming it the first digital transfer agent for a planned 24/7 Digital Trading Platform.

In Southeast Asia, Singapore’s Monetary Authority (MAS) is running the BLOOM initiative focused on tokenized settlement assets, positioning the city-state as a direct competitor to Australia for regional tokenization leadership.

What distinguishes Australia’s approach is the breadth of assets tested under a single central bank program. While many jurisdictions have run isolated pilots with one or two asset types, Project Acacia’s scope, covering bonds, repos, term deposits, investment funds, and trade payables across four separate blockchain platforms, represents one of the most comprehensive central bank tokenization experiments conducted to date.

The timing also creates an unusual contrast with broader crypto market conditions. The Fear & Greed Index sits at 14, deep in “Extreme Fear” territory, reflecting significant retail pessimism. Yet central banks and major financial institutions are moving forward with tokenization infrastructure at an accelerating pace, highlighting a growing divergence between retail sentiment and institutional adoption momentum.

Whether Australia can convert the RBA’s projections into realized economic gains will depend on how quickly the proposed sandbox launches, how effectively the three structural barriers Jones identified are addressed, and whether the coordination between regulators, banks, and technology providers holds together through implementation. The next concrete milestone will be the formation of the Regulator-Industry Tokenisation Advisory Group and the scope of the DFMI sandbox.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Cryptocurrency and digital asset markets carry significant risk. Always do your own research before making decisions.