Monument Bank Delays Tokenized Retail Deposits Project by Several Months

Monument Bank has delayed by several months a project to tokenize 250 million pounds in U.K. retail bank deposits after failing to find a local crypto custodian that met Financial Conduct Authority standards and could handle zero-knowledge privacy proofs. According to ChainCatcher, the London challenger bank now expects the rollout to reach retail customers in November after initially aiming to launch two months earlier. Founder Mintoo Bhandari said the bank had planned to tokenize customer deposits on Midnight, a privacy-focused Layer 1 blockchain funded by Charles Hoskinson. To meet regulatory requirements, Monument expanded its search for a custody partner overseas and ultimately found a Canadian custodian approved by the FCA. Monument announced the project in March and said it intended to offer tokenized private equity, structured products, and automated Lombard loans to mass affluent customers with investable assets between 50,000 pounds and 500,000 pounds. Bhandari said customer deposits will continue to earn interest, remain fully backed by Monument, be redeemable 1:1 for pounds, and be protected under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, subject to a 120,000-pound limit per person or company.