A bank that tokenised a bond three or four years ago could treat the exercise as a discrete proof of concept (PoC). The asset was issued and sold, while little in the bank’s existing trading, custody or client platforms had to change. “When you had a PoC, you could say, ‘We tokenised a bond, and then we sold it, and that was it,’” said Samar Sen, senior vice president and head of international markets at Talos, a financial technology company serving institutional digital asset markets.

Sen said some banks are now considering how bitcoin and tokenised assets could be made available through platforms on which clients already trade foreign exchange (FX), gold and equities. He described trading and custody infrastructure that can be used across wealth management, prime brokerage and other businesses rather than maintained separately for each use case. Once an asset is intended to be distributed, traded and serviced repeatedly, custody, settlement, treasury and controls become part of the same implementation decision.

Different strategies can require similar infrastructure

Sen divides banks into two broad groups. Some, including early adopters in Asia, decided to offer regulated crypto services in response to perceived client demand. Others remained cautious about crypto but became interested in tokenisation as an alternative way to issue or service instruments such as bonds, and in products including stablecoins and tokenised money market funds. Sen said both approaches can require similar trading, custody and connectivity infrastructure. “I have institutional clients trading FX, gold and equities with me, and I want to integrate into that same platform the ability to trade either Bitcoin or some kind of tokenised asset,” he said.

Secondary-market liquidity affects the infrastructure required. Sen said early tokenisation projects demonstrated that an asset could be represented on a blockchain without necessarily creating a market in which investors could readily sell it. He said secondary trading is emerging in areas including tokenised money market funds and bonds. An instrument intended to support repeated purchases, sales or use as collateral requires functions that a one-off issuance does not.

Existing client platforms may rely on different infrastructure underneath

“You can’t use your old FX trading platform to point to digital assets and say, ‘Okay, go,’” Sen said. In his description, banks require custody capable of holding digital assets, connections to digital asset liquidity providers and anti-money laundering tools that can analyse blockchain transactions.

Talos supplies technology used in parts of this process. Sen said technology providers are designing systems that connect with existing bank platforms, allowing custody and execution to be handled through separate infrastructure while the client continues to use the bank’s existing interface.

Longer trading hours change staffing and control requirements

Sen argues that digital asset services raise questions about how banks provide coverage outside established trading sessions. These include whether licences permit the activity, whether compliance and client support are available and who monitors risk when trading continues outside conventional market hours.

Official initiatives in 2026 show different approaches. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority said Project Ensemble’s controlled pilot environment would be progressively upgraded to support 24/7 settlement in tokenised central bank money, while the Eurosystem’s Pontes service is introducing tokenised wholesale settlement in central bank money with longer operating hours planned over time. These models suggest that operating hours may vary by asset, infrastructure and jurisdiction rather than follow a single market timetable.

Faster settlement changes how cash and assets are managed

Settlement presents a separate issue. “Do they have the treasury operations needed to instantly settle? That’s a different skillset from waiting for a clearing house to settle,” Sen said. Shorter settlement periods can reduce the duration of counterparty exposure, but they can also require cash or assets to be available earlier and reduce the time available for netting. That introduces intraday liquidity and funding considerations alongside the trading technology.

Work in 2026 also illustrates that settlement design concerns the form of money used as well as speed. BIS Project Agorá has demonstrated atomic, multi-currency settlement using tokenised commercial bank deposits and tokenised central bank reserves in a controlled test environment. The project remains experimental. The Eurosystem’s Pontes connects market distributed ledger platforms with settlement in central bank money. Together, these initiatives show that settlement design involves questions of payment finality, settlement assets and how newer platforms connect with existing central bank infrastructure.

Market utilities are adapting existing infrastructure

Established market infrastructure providers are also developing links between conventional and tokenised markets. The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) said in May 2026 that more than 50 financial industry firms were involved in work on its tokenisation service, which creates tokenised representations of securities held at its Depository Trust Company (DTC) subsidiary while retaining the existing legal ownership framework. In July 2026, DTCC said securities held at DTC had been converted into tokens and used in transactions including US Treasury repo, equity trading and delivery-versus-payment. DTCC has scheduled the wider launch of its tokenisation service for October 2026.

Sen said the digital asset vendor market remains fragmented, with banks potentially using different providers for tokenisation, custody and trading, and he expects some consolidation as institutions seek fewer points of integration. Market utilities can provide parts of the common infrastructure, but decisions on liquidity, staffing, compliance coverage and risk ownership remain with individual banks.

Conventional and tokenised processes may coexist

Sen does not expect markets to move directly from existing infrastructure to assets issued and managed entirely on blockchain networks. He expects an intermediate model in which tokenised instruments continue to rely on existing securities law and conventional legal structures while a digital representation trades using blockchain infrastructure. “I think that hybrid world will continue for five to seven years because it will allow firms to slowly enter new asset classes while keeping existing law, no chaos,” he said.

Regulatory treatment also remains part of the operating question. In Singapore, the Monetary Authority of Singapore began consulting in September 2026 on legislation to implement its stablecoin framework and referred to the potential use of regulated stablecoins as settlement assets in tokenised markets. For global banks, differences in product permissions, settlement arrangements and controls can require different operating approaches even where common technology is used.

Shared infrastructure complicates business-line investment decisions

Sen identifies a difference between the priorities of digital asset teams and established businesses. A trader comparing current crypto activity with the scale of the FX market may assign it a lower priority, while a debt capital markets banker focused on current bond transactions may have limited incentive to change an existing issuance process. “None of those guys on the front lines are thinking about how the future of banking is going to work because they are thinking in the short term,” he said. In Sen’s account, digital asset teams are often responsible for considering requirements that cut across several businesses.

That creates an investment question for banks considering broader digital asset services. Trading and custody infrastructure may serve several divisions, while each assesses its value against its own transaction volumes and priorities. The challenge is how to assess and fund that shared infrastructure, including the cost of operating conventional and tokenised processes alongside one another.