ECB looks to blockchain: Schnabel calls for a more 'on-chain' central bank

Blockchain could become part of the European Central Bank’s infrastructure. ECB Executive Board member Isabel Schnabel has argued that central banks should be able to operate on distributed infrastructures as well, using tokenized central-bank money for liquidity, settlement, and monetary-policy operations.

Why it matters

The remarks are significant because they show how deeply tokenization is entering the traditional-finance debate. The goal is not automatically to replace today’s system, but to avoid a future in which stablecoins and other private forms of digital money become the only infrastructure available to increasingly digital markets.

The ECB is already working on initiatives such as Pontes, designed to connect distributed-ledger platforms with existing payment systems, and Appia, which is studying longer-term infrastructure for tokenized financial markets. For crypto users, this is an important signal: blockchain and traditional finance are gradually converging, but under close institutional and regulatory attention.

Source: Reuters, August 28, 2026 — https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/ecb-should-embrace-blockchain-safeguard-its-role-schnabel-says-2026-08-28/

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