Anchorage Digital is giving banks a new way to move deposits onchain without forcing them to rebuild the systems that still run most of commercial banking.
The federally chartered crypto bank launched a tokenized deposit platform that lets financial institutions issue and manage blockchain-based representations of customer deposits. The underlying funds remain in traditional bank deposit accounts, while Anchorage provides the blockchain infrastructure, wallet management and smart contract technology behind the product.
That structure is aimed at a gap banks have been trying to close as stablecoins, private payment networks and crypto settlement rails push money movement closer to 24/7 availability. Anchorage says the platform is designed to sit beside existing core banking systems, giving banks a faster settlement layer without years of migration risk.
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CEO Nathan McCauley said many banks Anchorage is starting to work with are already thinking through tokenized deposits and how to offer them. The interest reflects a broader shift across traditional finance, where deposit tokens are being tested as a bank-native answer to stablecoins.
That is where tokenized deposits differ from stablecoins. USDC (CRYPTO: $USDC) and USDT (CRYPTO: $USDT) are issued by private companies and backed by reserve assets. Tokenized deposits keep the money inside commercial bank accounts, while turning those deposits into digital instruments that can move across blockchain rails.
The launch comes as tokenized deposits move from pilot projects into broader bank infrastructure planning. Major U.S. banks, including JPMorgan (NYSE: $JPM), Citi (NYSE: $C) and Bank of America (NYSE: $BAC) are planning a shared tokenized deposit network for the first half of 2027, while BitGo is working with ZKsync on bank-focused tokenized deposit infrastructure.
The product also moves Anchorage closer to the banking layer of onchain finance. The company already works with institutions across custody, trading and settlement, but tokenized deposits put it nearer to a bigger question facing banks: how to use blockchain rails without losing control of customer deposits.