DBS and Citi settled a cross-border USD payment in minutes on Sept. 5 using tokenized deposits on Swift's Digital Ledger, the network's 2nd confirmed live transaction.
Moving money from Singapore to New York on a Friday used to mean waiting until Monday, but DBS and Citi did it in minutes on a Saturday. The two banks announced Sept. 7 that they had completed the first cross-border USD payment on a weekend using tokenized deposits on Swift's Digital Ledger.
The transfer ran between DBS in Singapore and Citi's New York office. Settlement took minutes rather than the two-business-day limit that traditional cross-border payments require. The transaction processed outside standard banking hours, on a Saturday, without any of the delays that typically come with that timing.
It was the second confirmed live transaction on Swift's Digital Ledger. The first was completed by HSBC and Standard Chartered in August. Swift launched the ledger in July with 17 participating banks across six continents. DBS is the only Asian-headquartered institution in the network's 12-bank core design group.
Who the Capability Is Built For
The weekend gap in cross-border payments is not a minor inconvenience for companies running around-the-clock operations. A corporate treasurer moving liquidity from Singapore to New York on a Friday has funds frozen until the following week. For businesses in e-commerce and digital services, that delay creates real costs in the form of late supplier payments and idle working capital.
DBS said in its announcement that the Sept. 5 transaction shows those gaps can now be closed.
Rachel Chew, Group Chief Operating Officer at DBS, said the transaction demonstrates that tokenized money is moving from experimentation into practical use. Mridula Iyer, Citi's head of services for Asia South, said it proves that always-on cross-border payments are already a reality. Citi joined Swift's pilot for 24/7 tokenized deposit payments in July and has said its infrastructure supports near-instantaneous transfers across select markets. The bank is also part of a group of major US banks building a separate tokenized deposit network through The Clearing House, with a launch targeted for the first half of 2027.
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The Numbers Behind the Race To Modernize Payments
DBS launched a blockchain-powered banking suite in 2024 that included DBS Treasury Tokens for institutional liquidity management. A global survey by DBS found that half of finance leaders are already exploring blockchain tools for liquidity and foreign exchange purposes. Asia's outbound cross-border payment volumes are forecasted to climb to $24 trillion by 2033, up from $13.5 trillion in 2025, according to a Money 20/20 and FXC Intelligence report cited by DBS.
Swift's network has processed transactions for 53 years and handles an estimated $1.5 quadrillion annually. It now faces direct competition from stablecoins and tokenized payment systems that settle continuously without banking-hour restrictions. The two live transactions completed on its Digital Ledger in August and September represent the network's most concrete demonstration yet that it can operate on a comparable schedule.
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