Payments Canada launches new research under Project Jasper

Payments Canada, the Bank of Canada, financial innovation firm R3 Lab and Research Centre and seven financial institutions have come together as an industry to investigate distributed ledger technology (DLT) – a shared database – for interbank payments.

The associated project, named Project Jasper, marks a significant milestone in the payments industry. It is the first time in the world that a central bank participated in a DLT experiment in partnership with the private sector.

During Phase 1 of the project, a DLT prototype was built to investigate the use of central bank-issued digital receipts in lieu of cash to support settlement. Phase II of the project will focus on building a new DLT prototype on R3’s Corda platform by April 2017. The new prototype will be used for further experimentation focused on the settlement of payments.

For more information and to read the full Project Jasper primer, please visit