Digital rails decide not just how you owe money, but whose money you can touch.

Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and tokenised settlement are moving from pilots to production corridors.

The European Central Bank’s (ECB) digital euro remains in its preparation phase ahead of a 2025 decision (ECB, 2025).

The People’s Bank of China (PBoC) continues to expand e-CNY (PBoC, 2025).

Central banks report high levels of CBDC exploration (BIS, 2025).

Rapid stablecoin growth has sharpened concerns about post-national currencies (BIS, 2025).

The likely path is regionalisation: operational CBDCs within blocs, limited interoperability, and broader use of rails as control points.

For corporates, liquidity may be gated by compliance with bloc rules.

Corporate treasury teams should map dependencies now: Single European Payments Area (SEPA) Instant, stablecoin policies, wholesale CBDCs (EC/ECB, 2025; SWIFT, 2025).

5 - Europe’s Experiment in Fiscal Sovereignty

6 - Access as Strategy: Engineering the Capital Architecture