Over 8 in 10 businesses tap tokenised money for expansion, liquidity management: DBS survey

[SINGAPORE] The use of tokenised money is becoming increasingly mainstream among large corporations seeking greater liquidity and access to a wider range of markets, a DBS report on Wednesday (Oct 28) showed.

Among 422 business leaders surveyed across 11 markets, 88 per cent were already deploying or piloting tokenised money use cases.

The report, The Great Rewiring: Money in a New Order, polled leaders of companies with an annual revenue exceeding US$500 million between mid-June and mid-July 2026. 

“We know that tokenisation is increasing, and it’s going mainstream. But the pace whereby it is going mainstream is much faster than we expected,” said Lim Soon Chong, group head of global transaction services at DBS, during a media briefing on Tuesday.

“Companies are not standing still and they have to do things to adapt in this fast-changing environment,” he added. 

Trends in tokenised money

Stablecoins were the most widely adopted tokenised instrument among respondents, with 63 per cent using it or planning to do so, followed by 53 per cent for tokenised deposits and 52 per cent for tokenised money market funds.

Lim noted that stablecoins offer “significant benefits”, such as increasing fungibility across payment intermediaries and being “less cumbersome” from a permissioning standpoint. 

However, the latter also makes it “more difficult” to make stablecoins compliant with established norms for anti-money laundering and for enterprise use cases, he said. 

Lim noted that, therefore, the timeline for tokenised money to go mainstream largely depends on users, fellow intermediaries and the development of regulations.

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The report said that most leaders expect to reap the benefits of tokenised money, such as increased traceability and auditability, within the next two years. 

“Today we are investing less in tokenised money than traditional fiat money, traditional payment rails and settlement rails. We expect that equation to change,” said Lim, adding that the bank’s investment in tokenised money could potentially catch up with and exceed that of traditional money in two to three years.

Diversifying currency exposure

Against a backdrop of market volatility and trade fragmentation, over three-quarters of survey respondents adapted their operations and expanded into new markets.

South-east Asia emerged as a top destination among 65 per cent of those surveyed, followed by Australia and New Zealand at 50 per cent, and India at 45 per cent. 

Amid this volatility, 78 per cent of respondents also diversified their reliance on traditional settlement currencies by building exposure to multiple currencies that support more trading corridors. 

The renminbi, in particular, is gaining increased acceptance as a trade settlement currency, noted the report. It added that adoption is higher across markets with deep trade integration and geographic proximity to mainland China, such as in Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Indonesia and Singapore.

Meanwhile, respondents in Australia and the UK expressed the strongest interest in considering renminbi usage in the next one to two years. 

Han Kwee Juan, group head of institutional banking at DBS, noted that organisations are navigating a world shaped by “shifting trade corridors, new architectures of money and the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence”. 

“Business leaders need to rethink how they leverage new technologies such as AI and tokenised solutions, manage liquidity, currencies and cross-border flows, and build operating models that can adapt quickly to better withstand shocks,” added Han.