Australia's Central Bank is charting what it calls the future of money, and the direction is increasingly clear: wholesale tokenised finance. Following Project Acacia, its landmark experiment in tokenised transactions, the Reserve Bank has laid out a roadmap that puts programmable ledgers and tokenised settlement at the centre of its thinking. Assistant Governor (Financial System) Brad Jones set out the vision at Intersekt 2026 on 3 September 2026, the same day the Reserve Bank released a consultation on its settlement infrastructure, a joint paper with Treasury on retail digital currency, and a web page tracking ten post-Acacia initiatives. The ambition is big-picture, but the approach is deliberately grounded in real transactions, industry participation and a two-tier model that keeps central bank money at the foundation. This is Australia's attempt to modernise the plumbing of finance.

What the RBA Said

Jones anchored the pivot in the results of Project Acacia. The project brought together 57 industry participants to test 20 use cases, and, importantly, it dealt largely with real-money transactions rather than hypothetical scenarios. That gives the findings practical weight.

He also set out the conceptual framework: a two-tier monetary system. In this model, the central bank provides the foundational layer of stability, commercial bank deposits sit on top of that layer, and private industry innovates on the core infrastructure. The Reserve Bank's role is to keep the base secure and trustworthy, while leaving room for the private sector to build. Jones noted that the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority is increasingly engaged on the tokenisation of commercial bank deposits, a sign that regulators are preparing for privately-issued tokenised money as well.

Jones defined tokenisation itself as representing Assets or money as programmable tokens on a shared or distributed ledger. The appeal, he explained, lies in faster and atomic settlement, where assets and money move together simultaneously, reducing settlement risk and lowering the cost of intermediation.

The Key Numbers

Project Acacia: 57 participants, 20 use cases, mostly real-money transactions. Tokenisation potential: ~A$24bn/year (DFCRC). 50–80% of Australian fixed-income securities held offshore.

What Could Happen Next

The post-Acacia roadmap sets out the path forward, with ten initiatives now tracked publicly. Several concrete workstreams are already underway. The Treasury is examining a tokenised government bond, a potential flagship application of tokenised assets. A deposit-token working group is progressing work on tokenised private money. Cross-border payments have been named a priority, reflecting a focus of the G20 and the Payments System Board.

The Reserve Bank has also signalled it will review its Exchange Settlement Account access policy following government licensing reforms, which could shape which institutions can plug into the settlement system in a tokenised future.

The overarching next step is turning experiments into infrastructure. The findings from Acacia's real-money use cases now feed into decisions about how Australia's financial plumbing should evolve, a process the Reserve Bank frames as multi-year rather than immediate.

Conclusion

The Reserve Bank's pivot to tokenised finance marks a considered bet on the future of money. Building on Project Acacia's 57 participants, 20 use cases and real-money transactions, and pointing to an estimated 24 billion dollars a year in potential benefits, the central bank is prioritising wholesale tokenisation within a two-tier system that keeps central bank money at its core. This is about institutions and markets, not a consumer digital dollar. With a tokenised government bond under examination, a deposit-token working group active and cross-border payments a priority, Australia is moving from experimentation toward infrastructure. The destination, faster, safer and cheaper settlement, is ambitious; the approach, grounded in real transactions and careful staging, is deliberately measured.