Until today, Eurobonds were paper based. Now Clearstream and Euroclear Bank, the two International Central Securities Depositories (ICSDs), are both live with dematerialized Eurobond infrastructure to cater to the €15.3 trillion market. This digitalization does not yet involve tokenization, but it is a critical step in that direction. Initially it covers English law issuance, with plans to expand support for other jurisdictions.
Eurobonds are often misinterpreted as European instruments. In fact they are international but issued in a currency other than the issuer’s domestic currency. They need not use the euro or be issued in Europe. The market is huge, not just in monetary terms but in breadth. There are more than 350,000 instruments in circulation from more than 12,000 issuers based in 130 countries. The global nature of blockchain is well suited to Eurobonds.
“A market of this scale—valued at more than € 15 trillion and experiencing double-digit growth in 2025 could not remain paper-based,” said Isabelle Delorme, Head of Product Strategy & Innovation at Euroclear. “It was neither sustainable nor fit for purpose to meet the needs of borrowers and their partners.”
The dematerialization is part of a broader digital push by the two ICSDs. When they published their jointly developed Issuance & Processing Taxonomy (IPT) last September, they mentioned plans for a DLT-focused extension. Last year Clearstream’s Jens Hachmeister told Ledger Insights that we can expect a tokenized Eurobond to be issued on the Clearstream D7 DLT platform soon. To date the European Investment Bank has launched many firsts for digital bonds, and given its longstanding work with Clearstream, it would not be surprising if it was the first issuer of a DLT-based Eurobond.
