Briefing - The “other” digital euro: the ECB’s projects Pontes and Appia - 03-06-2026
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While the retail digital euro project receives much political attention, the parallel process to develop a wholesale digital euro for use among financial market participants should not be overlooked. This briefing outlines and explains the European Central BaBriefing - The “other” digital euro: the ECB’s projects Pontes and Appia - 03-06-2026
While the retail digital euro project receives much political attention, the parallel process to develop a wholesale digital euro for use among financial market participants should not be overlooked. This briefing outlines and explains the European Central Bank’s projects Pontes and Appia and discusses their utility and potential for strengthening EU financial market integration. Pontes aims at establishing an interface between central bank money and tradable assets in the form of digital tokens. Appia is a more long-term project exploring the overall ecosystem and governance around such tokenised assets. Our briefing concludes that Pontes and Appia are a necessary condition for the EU to benefit from the promises of this technology, which can help addressing the inefficiencies of fragmented market infrastructures and thus support the Savings and Investment Union. By themselves, however, these projects might not be sufficient to overcome national silos. Doing so is likely to require harmonisation efforts at the level of securities and company laws. Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP














