DTCC, Chainlink Complete Pilot to Accelerate Fund Tokenization with JPMorgan, Templeton, BNY Mellon Participating; LINK Gains 7%

The Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC), the world’s largest securities settlement system, completed a pilot project with blockchain oracle Chainlink (LINK) and multiple major U.S. financial institutions, aiming to help accelerate the tokenization of funds, according to a Thursday report published by DTCC.

The purpose of project called Smart NAV was to establish a standardized process to bring and disseminate net asset value (NAV) data of funds across virtually any private or public blockchains using Chainlink's interoperability protocol CCIP. Market participants included American Century Investments, BNY Mellon, Edward Jones, Franklin Templeton, Invesco, JPMorgan, MFS Investment Management, Mid Atlantic Trust, State Street and U.S. Bank.

By completing the pilot, DTCC "found that by delivering structured data on-chain and creating standard roles and processes, foundational data could be embedded into a multitude of on-chain use cases, such as tokenized funds and 'bulk consumer' smart contracts, which are contracts that hold data for multiple funds," the report reads.

Chainlink's native token LINK gained more than 7% following the news of the DTCC pilot, hitting $15 for the first time since May 6, outperforming the broader crypto market benchmark CoinDesk 20 Index's (CD20) slight decline during the same period.

Read more: Why Asset Tokenization Is Inevitable

The pilot took place as tokenization of real-world assets (RWA) such as bonds, funds and other traditional investments has become one of the hottest use cases for blockchain technology. Multiple financial heavyweights like BlackRock, Citi and HSBC has thrown their hat in the ring pursuing benefits such as operational efficiencies, speedier settlements and increased transparency compared to using traditional financial plumbing.

UPDATE (May 16, 20:25 UTC): Adds LINK token price advance.