Building Bridges: Luxembourg’s Path to Leadership in Tokenisation and Digital Assets

Fireside chat — From global momentum to national leadership

In the opening conversation, moderated by Ananda Kautz, the global landscape was sharply contextualised.
Laurent Marochini noted that institutional adoption has reached a decisive turning point: “Three years ago the market was 80% retail and 20% institutional. Today it’s the other way around.”

Laurent highlighted Asia, particularly Singapore and Hong Kong, as the fastest-moving region, and pointed to a remarkable regulatory acceleration in the United States. Europe, he explained, is advancing more slowly in stablecoins and crypto-assets adoption, yet leads decisively in tokenisation and regulatory development.

For Luxembourg, this creates a unique opportunity. Building on its role as Europe’s largest fund centre, Laurent argued that the country could become“the first tokenised fund centre in Europe, and potentially in the world.”

Ananda summarised the challenge succinctly: “Luxembourg has the tools. The question now is: how do we turn these tools into scale?”

Both emphasised the importance of responsible innovation, continuous dialogue with the CSSF, and coordinated industry action through the ABBL.

Looking ahead, Laurent described how success could be measured if the community reconvened in five years: “Success means more companies in Luxembourg – and more clients and business. The more players we attract, the more opportunities we create.”

Panel discussion: Building bridges across the ecosystem

The panel discussion, moderated by Giulia Pescatore, Senior Manager, Strategy & Innovation at Deloitte Luxembourg, brought together four key figures representing different pillars of the financial ecosystem:

• Nadia Manzari, Avocate à la Cour, Founding Partner, Manzari Legal
• Nick Ashton, Director, Country Head – Belgium & Luxembourg, Global Payments Solutions, HSBC
• Olivier Chapiteau, Funding Officer, European Investment Bank (EIB)
• Olivier Portenseigne, CEO, FundsDLT

Together, they explored how Luxembourg can strengthen its position in tokenised finance.

Speakers pointed to the rapid global rise of institutional activity, real-world-asset tokenisation, and on-chain cash solutions, all developments that create concrete opportunities for Luxembourg.

The country’s regulatory framework, rooted in national blockchain laws and strengthened by MiCA and the DLT Pilot Regime, was cited as a major competitive advantage.

The next challenges are operational: ensuring interoperability, aligning standards, and deepening engagement with the CSSF to support large-scale deployment.

Banks are already moving from pilots to implementation, including tokenised deposits, on-chain settlement and digital-asset custody. Luxembourg’s early involvement positions it well, but scaling will require cross-bank connectivity and global standards.

In capital markets, digital-bond issuances, some settled using experimental wholesale CBDC infrastructures, demonstrate both the potential and the need for tighter integration between on-chain cash and traditional custody channels.

The fund industry remains the largest Web3 opportunity. Tokenised fund shares and DLT-based distribution models continue to progress, but broader adoption across transfer agents, asset managers and distributors will be essential to unlock full scale.

Industry bodies such as the ABBL can accelerate the transition through education, standardisation and ecosystem coordination.

As Andrey Martovoy, Senior Adviser – Innovation & Digital at the ABBL, summarised: “Looking ahead, the key priority identified is simple: drive adoption.”

Attracting more service providers, onboarding institutional clients and delivering real tokenisation projects will anchor Luxembourg as Europe’s leading hub for digital assets, ensuring it not only keeps pace with global developments but helps set the European benchmark for innovation.