Fnality Names Cunliffe UK Chair, Adds Central Bankers

Highlights

Fnality appointed Sir Jon Cunliffe, the former Bank of England Deputy Governor for Financial Stability, as chair of its UK board.
Jochen Metzger, ex-Deutsche Bundesbank director general, and Ron Berndsen, former De Nederlandsche Bank oversight chief, join Fnality Europe's supervisory board.
Fnality's sterling wholesale settlement system has been live under Bank of England regulation since 2023, and it is now seeking approvals to launch dollar and euro versions.
The company raised a $136 million Series C round in September 2025 led by WisdomTree, Bank of America, Citi, KBC Group, Temasek and Tradeweb.

Blockchain payments firm Fnality has appointed Sir Jon Cunliffe, the former Bank of England Deputy Governor for Financial Stability, as chair of its UK board of directors. Cunliffe spent more than three decades overseeing financial market infrastructure and payment systems at the Bank of England before stepping down. He is joined by two other veteran central bankers: Jochen Metzger, the former Deutsche Bundesbank director general for payments and settlement systems, who is expected to chair Fnality Europe's supervisory board, and Ron Berndsen, the former head of oversight and market infrastructure policy at Dutch central bank De Nederlandsche Bank, who joins the same board.

Fnality operates a wholesale payment system that lets participating banks settle obligations against each other using tokenized central bank money rather than conventional correspondent-banking rails. Its sterling system, regulated directly by the Bank of England, has been live since December 2023 and already supports use cases including the settlement of tokenized securities and foreign-exchange transactions. The company is now pursuing the regulatory approvals it needs to extend the same model to dollar- and euro-denominated systems, a process that involves winning sign-off from multiple national regulators and central banks rather than a single approval.

The new appointments follow a $136 million Series C funding round Fnality closed in September 2025, led by WisdomTree, Bank of America, Citi, KBC Group, Temasek and Tradeweb, with existing backers including Goldman Sachs, UBS, Santander, Barclays, BNP Paribas, DTCC, Euroclear, ING, Nasdaq Ventures and State Street also participating. According to the company, that capital is earmarked for expanding the network to additional currencies, strengthening liquidity-management tools, and building interoperability with stablecoins and tokenized deposits — the same asset classes major banks are racing to bring on-chain. In its announcement of the appointments, Fnality Group CEO Michelle Neal said the hires reflect “a shared conviction that regulated on-chain settlement services in central bank money are foundational for finance's future.”

Why the Hires Matter

The hires are as much a signal as a governance change. Fnality's entire pitch rests on convincing regulators and the world's largest banks that settling in tokenized central bank money is safer and faster than existing correspondent-banking infrastructure, and installing three officials who spent their careers running or overseeing exactly that infrastructure gives the company a credibility argument that few blockchain-native competitors can match. Cunliffe, in the company's announcement, framed the stakes plainly: “Settlement in the safest assets available will be crucial to maintaining financial stability” as more of the financial system moves on-chain. Metzger's comments pointed to the harder unsolved problem — connecting settlement systems denominated in different reserve currencies — which is precisely the dollar-and-euro expansion Fnality is now pursuing.

The move also fits a broader pattern of banks and market infrastructure providers racing to build regulated, bank-controlled alternatives to public blockchain rails. A coalition of 39 US state banking groups recently moved to build their own bank-run blockchain network, and HSBC and Standard Chartered completed the first live tokenized-deposit transfer over Swift's own infrastructure earlier this year. Fnality's model differs in one important respect: rather than tokenizing commercial-bank deposits, it settles directly in central bank money, which removes counterparty credit risk from the settlement step entirely — a distinction its new board chair, who spent years safeguarding exactly that kind of financial stability, is well positioned to defend to skeptical regulators.

What Comes Next

The near-term test for Fnality is whether the credibility of its new board translates into faster regulatory sign-off for the dollar and euro systems, neither of which has a confirmed launch date. Cunliffe's and Metzger's networks inside the Bank of England, the Federal Reserve's counterparts, and the Eurosystem could meaningfully shorten those approval timelines, given that wholesale settlement systems require coordination across multiple national regulators rather than a single green light. Also worth watching: how quickly Fnality deploys the $136 million raised in its Series C toward stablecoin and tokenized-deposit interoperability, an area where competition from bank consortia and Swift-based alternatives is intensifying by the month.

FAQ

What does Fnality do?
Fnality operates a wholesale payment system that lets banks settle transactions using tokenized central bank money instead of conventional correspondent-banking rails, with its sterling system live under Bank of England regulation since December 2023.

Who is Jon Cunliffe?
Sir Jon Cunliffe is the former Bank of England Deputy Governor for Financial Stability, who oversaw UK financial market infrastructure and payment systems for more than three decades before joining Fnality as UK board chair.

What currencies does Fnality plan to add next?
Fnality is seeking regulatory approvals to launch dollar- and euro-denominated settlement systems alongside its existing sterling system, though no launch dates have been confirmed.

How much funding has Fnality raised?
Fnality closed a $136 million Series C round in September 2025 led by WisdomTree, Bank of America, Citi, KBC Group, Temasek and Tradeweb, adding to backing from Goldman Sachs, UBS and other major banks.