Palau has contracted Japanese financial software company Soramitsu to create a platform to issue and manage government bonds. The project is expected to begin trials this fiscal year with a live rollout possible next year. This is the latest of several blockchain projects the country has invested in.
The Nikkei reported that the contract was finalized in June and is worth “several hundred million yen,” with 100 million yen equivalent to around $630,000. That is less than half the cost of such a system using traditional technology, the newspaper added. The project will receive aid from Japan’s Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, as well as strategic and management advice from the foreign and finance ministries.
Palau puts blockchain tech to good use
Palau uses the US dollar as its currency and currently does not have a bond platform. Most of the country’s approximately 18,000 citizens, who are spread across 340 Pacific islands, use the services of US banks, according to The Nikkei, so the new platform will allow the government to tap into citizens’ savings.
Palau has partnered with Ripple Labs to create a US dollar-pegged stablecoin on Ripple’s XRP Ledger central bank digital currency (CBDC) platform. That project launched in 2021 and proceeded to the second phase of its launch program at the end of 2023.
Palau launched a digital residency program using the privacy-protecting Root Name System in January 2022 in conjunction with Cryptic Labs. The system provides a blockchain-based ID in the form of a non-fungible token with Know Your Customer verification. The program went live on the BNB chain in June 2022.
Soramitsu supports projects throughout Asia and the Pacific
Soramitsu supported the launch of a CBDC proof-of-concept project in the Solomon Islands in November. The company was instrumental in the launch of Cambodia’s CBDC-like bakong digital currency in 2020.
The bakong was used as a model for the proof-of-concept of Laos’s DLak. That project was launched in February 2023 under a Memorandum of Understanding signed by Soramitsu and the Bank of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.
In August, Soramitsu announced plans to create an Asian cross-border payment system using the bakong and stablecoin. It also expressed the hope of establishing a stablecoin exchange in Japan.