Societe General Forge (Forge), the digital assets arm of the bank, has launched the CAST Challenge, a competition for creating security token solutions that work on multiple DLT networks. The challenge is open to both startup teams and institutions active in the blockchain arena and will run through to June. Applications close March 21 and prizes include awards of up to €150,000 and the chance to get involved in a security token issuance with a big name institution.
The jury panel is drawn from major institutions, including the Banque de France’s innovation lab, SWIFT, AXA Investment Managers, ABN Amro, Santander, Societe Generale and Visa.
Participants will create open source code components around the CAST (Compliant Architecture for Security Tokens) Framework that Forge developed during its previous token issuances, including in 2019, 2020 and 2021 for itself, as well as the European Investment Bank (EIB). Forge wants to establish the CAST Framework as an industry standard for security tokens.
As previously explored, the current CAST Framework mirrors the existing market setup with a Registrar that keeps an off-chain securities registry. It’s not a matter of Forge not recognizing the efficiency benefits of native security tokens. On the contrary, it proposes this standard to enable the market to transition from the current status quo and evolve. As regulations evolve, so will the standard.
The CAST Challenge competition has five potential tasks, most of which should be blockchain agnostic:
- use existing standards to create a universal security token standard
- a settlement coin to enable atomic settlement across different blockchains
- a reporting tool for security tokens
- connect blockchain-based transactions on different DLTs with SWIFT
- develop multi-chain data feeds (oracles) to feed data to any blockchain. eg. for exchange rates, interest rates, agency ratings
Meanwhile, SocGen Forge’s three token issuances for the group were recently listed on LuxSE SOL. In other news, ICE, the parent of the NYSE invested in security token platform tZERO.
