71% of finance leaders expect tokenization to reshape UK

A Lloyds Banking Group survey found that 71% of major UK finance leaders expect tokenization to reshape financial services, with faster payments and settlement cited as the top benefit. The findings arrive as the UK pushes tokenized finance from pilots into national market infrastructure.

Key Takeaways

• Lloyds polled 100 senior decision-makers across major UK banks, insurers, asset managers and financial sponsors.
• Faster payments and settlement ranked as the biggest potential benefit, cited by 60% of respondents.
• 41% pointed to improved collateral and liquidity management as a key upside of tokenization.
• UK policymakers are pressing to move tokenized finance beyond pilots and into core market infrastructure.
• A government-backed task force estimated leadership in tokenized finance could add up to £33 billion to UK annual output by 2035.

Nearly three-quarters of major UK financial institutions now see blockchain-based tokenization as a force that will reshape how payments, settlement and liquidity management work. The annual Lloyds survey adds fresh weight to that view just as London races to turn pilots into production-grade rails. For more coverage of institutional crypto and digital assets, see our Fintech & Crypto Alerts hub.

Why do finance leaders expect tokenization to matter?

According to Cointelegraph’s report on the Lloyds survey, 71% of respondents expect tokenization to reshape financial services. Lloyds Banking Group, the UK’s largest financial services provider, surveyed senior decision-makers at banks, insurers, asset managers and financial sponsors.

Lloyds said moving assets and payments onto digital infrastructure could free up capital and liquidity tied up in transactions, letting institutions redeploy those resources elsewhere. That capital-efficiency case helps explain why boardrooms are treating tokenization as more than a niche experiment.

What benefits of tokenization did respondents cite?

Faster payments and settlement emerged as the most significant perceived benefit, named by 60% of those polled. Improved collateral and liquidity management followed, cited by 41%.

“The next phase is about turning those individual use cases into infrastructure that works at scale, with the interoperability and common standards needed to connect digital and traditional markets,” said Rob Hale, co-head of global markets at Lloyds.

Lloyds has also tested the technology itself. Earlier this year, the bank worked with Archax and Canton Network on what it described as the UK’s first public blockchain transaction using tokenized deposits to purchase a tokenized UK government bond.

How is the UK building tokenized finance infrastructure?

The survey lands as UK policymakers push tokenization beyond pilot projects. In May, the Bank of England proposed extending its core settlement infrastructure toward near-24/7 availability. A subsequent government payments blueprint called for tokenized and traditional forms of money to operate within an interoperable payments system.

In July, a government-backed industry task force estimated that leadership in tokenized finance could add as much as 33 billion British pounds ($44 billion) to the UK’s annual economic output by 2035. It also called for the country’s first tokenized government bond by early 2027.

That same month, the US and UK treasuries recommended creating a private-sector group to test cross-border uses of tokenized assets and urged US financial regulators and the Bank of England to identify shared approaches to regulation. The message from both markets and policymakers is clear: finance leaders expect tokenization to move from pilots to pipes.