Citi Treasury and Trade Solutions Unveils Digital Asset Solution for Cash Management and Trade Finance

Citi Treasury and Trade Solutions has introduced a new digital asset solution called Citi Token Services, which aims to enhance cash management and trade finance capabilities. By leveraging blockchain technology and smart contracts, this solution provides institutional clients with “always-on” and programmable financial services, including cross-border payments, liquidity management, and automated trade finance solutions.

The development of Citi Token Services is part of the bank’s commitment to delivering real-time, next-generation transaction banking services to its institutional clients. This initiative is part of a broader effort to create interoperable digital asset solutions on a multi-bank basis.

One of the applications of Citi Token Services is in trade finance. Through a successful pilot, Citi collaborated with Maersk and a canal authority to digitize bank guarantees and letters of credit. This enabled instant payments to service providers through smart contracts, reducing transaction processing times from days to minutes.

The technology used in the pilot offers a fully digital process for both buyers and sellers, eliminating the need for manual paperwork and significantly improving efficiency.

Citi Token Services has also been implemented in a global cash management pilot, allowing clients to transfer liquidity between Citi branches on a 24/7 basis. This enables corporate treasurers to manage global liquidity in a just-in-time and programmable manner, eliminating frictions related to cut-off times and service gaps.

Unlike other blockchain solutions, Citi’s private/permissioned blockchain technology eliminates the need for clients to host a blockchain node to access the services.

The unveiling of Citi Token Services follows Citi Treasury and Trade Solutions’ recent introduction of a suite of payment solutions tailored for financial institutions, aimed at enhancing client experience.

With the introduction of Citi Token Services, Citi is leveraging blockchain technology and smart contracts to provide institutional clients with enhanced cash management and trade finance capabilities. This solution enables real-time, always-on financial services, including cross-border payments, liquidity management, and automated trade finance solutions. The successful pilot in trade finance demonstrated the programmable transfer of tokenized deposits, enabling instant payments and reducing transaction processing times. Additionally, the global cash management pilot allows clients to transfer liquidity between Citi branches on a 24/7 basis, eliminating frictions related to cut-off times. Citi’s private/permissioned blockchain technology removes the need for clients to host a blockchain node, simplifying access to the services. Source: PYMNTS