RBA opens stablecoin reserve-access debate, holds off retail CBDC

The Reserve Bank of Australia opened a consultation on whether its settlement infrastructure should accommodate tokenised assets, private digital money and possible central-bank reserve access for stablecoin issuers.

The RBA announced the consultation on Sept. 3, alongside a joint paper with the Australian Treasury reaffirming that there is currently no clear public-interest case for a retail central bank digital currency. The two publications establish a split direction: Australia is advancing work on institutional tokenised settlement while declining, for now, to issue digital central-bank money for everyday public use.

That distinction matters for stablecoins and tokenised deposits. The RBA is examining whether private digital money can connect more safely to central-bank settlement, but it has not approved stablecoin issuers for reserve accounts, committed to tokenised central-bank reserves or selected a technical model.

Consultation targets wholesale settlement

The Reserve Bank Information and Transfer System, or RITS, allows eligible institutions with Exchange Settlement Accounts to settle obligations in central-bank reserves. Its Fast Settlement Service supports real-time settlement for payments submitted through Australia’s New Payments Platform.

The consultation asks how those services might support delivery-versus-payment transactions involving tokenised assets. Delivery-versus-payment coordinates the transfer of an asset with payment, reducing the risk that one side completes while the other does not.

The RBA is also seeking views on exchanges between tokenised private money issued by different institutions and conversions between tokenised money and conventional bank accounts. A further section explores the potential issuance, distribution, funding and liquidity management of tokenised central-bank reserves, sometimes discussed internationally as wholesale CBDC.

For stablecoins, the paper examines several possible structures. These include expanding eligibility for existing settlement accounts, creating reserve-only accounts primarily used to hold backing assets, or allowing an intermediary to hold pooled central-bank reserves through an omnibus arrangement.

These are consultation options, not adopted policies. The RBA explicitly declined to identify a preferred model. It said any decision would require further technical analysis, policy work and stakeholder engagement. Questions about account access would also form part of a broader review after proposed Australian payment-service reforms, including stablecoin regulation, pass.

Reserve backing could reduce private credit exposure

Non-bank stablecoin issuers are generally ineligible for Exchange Settlement Accounts under current arrangements. Project Acacia participants nevertheless expressed interest in using central-bank reserves as partial or full stablecoin backing.

Central-bank reserves do not carry the credit risk of a commercial issuer. Allowing a stablecoin issuer to hold them could therefore strengthen confidence in the assets supporting a token used for wholesale settlement. It would not eliminate operational, liquidity, governance, cybersecurity or redemption risks, and the consultation does not determine whether reserve balances would earn interest or what prudential requirements would apply.

The RBA is also asking whether reserve access would be used for backing, issuance and redemption, liquidity management or exchanges with other forms of private money. Responses are due Oct. 30.

Retail CBDC remains on hold

The separate RBA-Treasury assessment concluded that existing payment options continue to serve Australian households and businesses adequately. Its evidence included 33 focus groups involving 239 participants across metropolitan, regional and remote locations between Feb. 9 and July 2, 2026.

Participants generally struggled to identify a distinct personal benefit from retail CBDC and often preferred improvements to existing payment methods. Cash remained valued for simplicity and resilience during outages.

Those findings require a limitation: focus groups provide qualitative evidence and are not statistically representative of Australia’s population. The agencies therefore used them as one input alongside payment-system and international developments, not as a national referendum.

The consultation and joint assessment carry a Sept. 3 Australian publication date; neither page displays an exact release time. Coinburn’s publication window is the Sept. 3 open in America/New_York. No market-price or percentage-performance claim is included. The next material milestones are consultation responses, any subsequent RITS proposal and the future review of settlement-account eligibility.