- Australia’s central bank used a pilot wholesale CBDC to settle tokenized asset trades across public and private DLT networks, including the XRP Ledger.
- Project Acacia tested Australian government bond activity on XRPL, with RLUSD used for settlement in Zerocap’s pilot.
Australia’s central bank has moved tokenized finance from theory into live market testing. The Reserve Bank of Australia and the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre just released the final Project Acacia report, and the XRP Ledger was one of the major winners.
The report confirmed that the pilot wholesale CBDC settled live transactions across several blockchain networks. It carried an Australian dollar value, gave holders a direct legal claim on the RBA, and could be redeemed at par when the trial ended. That design gave participants a controlled way to test settlement with central bank money while keeping the trial within a limited research setting.
‼️JUST IN: AUSTRALIA’S RBA DEPLOYS WHOLESALE CBDC DIRECTLY ONTO XRPL AND HEDERA NETWORKS IN PROJECT ACACIA‼️
The Reserve Bank of Australia just ran real money on both the XRPL and Hedera.💸
This is a massive development.🙇♂️
Project Acacia is a hands-on research program run by… pic.twitter.com/s2REdKPlNN
— SMQKE (@SMQKEDQG) May 19, 2026
Notably, the project covered 20 wholesale tokenized asset market use cases. These tests included government bonds, corporate bonds, private credit, asset-backed securities, repos, carbon credits, and mining royalties. Participants also tested exchange settlement account balances, tokenized bank deposits, stablecoins, and the pilot wholesale CBDC.
XRP Ledger Handles Bond Settlement Test
One of the clearest XRP Ledger use cases came through Zerocap’s bond pilot. The firm tested the full lifecycle of an Australian government bond created as a digital twin on a public-permissioned version of XRP Ledger. The trial covered primary issuance, secondary trading, redemption, a central limit order book, and automated market maker functions.
Settlement in the Zerocap pilot used RLUSD stablecoin. The setup showed how a tokenized bond could move through issuance, trading, and redemption while using blockchain infrastructure for settlement and market activity.
The RBA did not present the project as a commercial launch. Instead, it framed Project Acacia as a research program for wholesale market infrastructure. Even so, the test placed XRP Ledger inside a formal central bank study that examined how tokenized assets and digital money can work together in real financial market settings.
Hedera also formed part of the project. Australian Payments Plus tested a token interchange service using public-permissioned Hedera and private-permissioned Hedera HashSphere. That pilot focused on exchanging different forms of privately issued tokenized money, including stablecoins and deposit tokens, through rules captured in smart contracts.
Project Acacia found that tokenization can improve several parts of wholesale markets. The RBA and DFCRC report pointed to faster settlement, lower counterparty risk, better capital use, and automated asset servicing. However, it also identified challenges that regulators and industry still need to address before these systems can scale.
The next phase will focus on coordination between regulators and market participants. The RBA and DFCRC outlined work on a possible regulatory sandbox for digital financial market infrastructure, tokenized government bond issuance, interoperable commercial bank deposit tokens, and further exploration of wholesale CBDC.
Brad Jones, Assistant Governor for Financial System at the RBA, said the project brought public agencies and industry together during a period of fast technology change.
He added:
“The scope of future initiatives we are outlining today is ambitious, covering tokenized assets, money, and new infrastructure arrangements. It will take a collective effort to ensure Australia’s financial system is well-positioned for the digital age.”
In March, Australia licensed a digital Australian dollar after ASIC granted AUDC Pty Ltd a full financial services license. The approval gave AUDD a regulated path for institutional payments on the XRP Ledger, with the token backed 1:1 by Australian dollars held in segregated trust accounts.
