UK Unveils Retail Payments Blueprint for Tokenized, Multi-Money Ecosystem

The UK government set out its National Payments Vision in 2024, with implementation led by the Payments Vision Delivery Committee, comprising HM Treasury, the Bank of England, the Financial Conduct Authority and the Payment Systems Regulator. As stablecoins, tokenized deposits and distributed ledgers gain traction, legacy systems including Faster Payments and Bacs must be upgraded to support interoperability, competition and payment security.

On July 2, 2026, the committee published an update on responsibilities within the retail payments ecosystem and set out five desired outcomes. It called for a single core clearing and messaging layer, using common technical standards, scheme rules and settlement in central bank money, to connect existing and emerging forms of digital money. Programmable and tokenized payments would be treated as product-layer innovations. The document accompanies an RPIB consultation, and no construction budget or investment amount has been announced.