Dutch securities cannot yet be issued and transferred solely as tokens under the existing national framework, according to an AFM/DNB study announced on 7 October. Brokers and infrastructure providers can use hybrid arrangements, but the legal ownership record remains central to their design.[1]
The report identifies a specific mismatch. The Securities Giro Transfer Act assumes securities already exist before entry into a central securities depository’s deposit. Civil-law issuance and transfer formalities also remain relevant. Updating a distributed ledger does not automatically complete those legal acts. Indirect tokenisation can use DLT within the established administration.[2]
Europe’s DLT Pilot Regime deals with a different layer: permission for market infrastructure and conditional exemptions from specified trading and settlement requirements. Its recital 45 expressly recognises that national corporate and securities laws still govern parts of the process. The pilot therefore cannot be treated as a single European title-transfer code.[3]
For a platform using parallel records, the practical design question is which entry establishes the investor’s rights and how discrepancies are resolved. The trade confirmation and wallet display need to be consistent with that legally effective record.[3]
The pilot’s own requirements reinforce the need for that documentation. Article 7 requires operators to publish legal terms defining responsibilities and liabilities. Where they safeguard client assets or access keys, they must segregate them and protect them from unauthorised use. Technology permission and the contractual allocation of custody responsibilities must therefore be assessed together.[3]
AFM and DNB recommend a joint process with ministries and market participants to test use cases and identify legal clarification or amendments. Update, 29 October 2026: a DNB speech on 26 October again described exploring legal solutions with those parties as the next step. Neither cited announcement supplies an enacted replacement framework or implementation deadline.[1][4]
Sources & further reading
- AFM en DNB pleiten voor duidelijk juridisch kader voor tokenisatie (Dutch) AFM · 7 Oct 2026 · Accessed 29 Oct 2026
- Tokenisatie van effecten in Nederland (Dutch) AFM and DNB · 7 Oct 2026 · Accessed 29 Oct 2026
- Regulation 2022/858: DLT Pilot Regime European Union · 2 Jun 2022 · Accessed 29 Oct 2026
- One Euro Is One Euro: Preserving the Singleness of Money in a Digital Age De Nederlandsche Bank · Accessed 29 Oct 2026