The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and the central banks of France, Singapore, and Switzerland have announced the successful completion of Project Mariana, a new CBDC initiative that tested cross-border trading and settlement of wholesale central bank digital currencies (wCBDCs) between financial institutions. The project leverages Decentralized Finance (DeFi) technology on a public blockchain, potentially heralding a new era in the digital currency world.

The collaboration between BIS Innovation Hub centers, Banque de France, Monetary Authority of Singapore, and Swiss National Bank has successfully validated the trading and settlement of hypothetical euro, Singapore dollar, and Swiss franc wCBDCs. Key aspects discussed included establishing a standardized technical token and creating bridges to facilitate seamless wCBDC transfers, as well as exploring the Automated Market Maker (AMM) concept for automatic pricing and execution of spot FX transactions.

The inclusion of DeFi technology, such as automated market makers, could pave the way for a new generation of financial market infrastructures. Project Mariana's architecture balances central banks' domestic need for oversight with the interest of financial institutions to hold, transfer, and settle wCBDC across borders efficiently. However, this is still an experimental phase, and BIS plans to further investigate the opportunities and challenges tied to CBDC and its associated technologies in collaboration with its partners.