World Gold council to develop shared infrastructure for digital gold

The World Gold Council (WGC) today unveiled a groundbreaking initiative to develop shared market infrastructure for digital gold, designed to accelerate the next stage of its evolution.

Co-authoring a White Paper with Boston Consulting Group titled Digital Gold: The Case for a Shared Infrastructure, the WGC introduced Gold as a Service, an open platform to streamline the issuance and operation of scalable, interoperable digital gold products.

The platform seeks to bridge the gap between physical gold custody and digital systems, standardising key processes including custody coordination, reconciliation, compliance, and redemption. The model aims to reduce operational complexity, improve accessibility, and ensure consistency across all digital gold products.

Addressing Barriers to Digital Gold

Despite significant digitalisation in trading, clearing, and recordkeeping, digital gold has faced structural constraints. Limited standardisation and fungibility have restricted its ability to integrate fully with modern financial systems.

Gold as a Service is designed to address these challenges, modernising gold’s role while maintaining the foundational attributes that have made it a trusted asset for millennia.

Key features of the platform include:

• Seamless Product Issuance and Management: Simplifies creation, issuance, and management of digital gold products.
• Ease of Trade: Increases fungibility, enabling consistent value and legal rights across platforms.
• Embedded Trust and Assurance: Continuous reconciliation, audits, and proof of physical backing strengthen confidence in digital gold.
• Interoperability by Design: Facilitates integration with existing financial infrastructure and emerging digital rails.
• Broader Utility: Enhanced liquidity and fungibility allow gold to be used as deployable capital, including as collateral for borrowing.

David Tait, CEO of the World Gold Council, commented:
“Financial services are undergoing a rapid and pervasive digital transformation and gold must also evolve to maintain its role in the global financial system. Gold as a Service is the latest step in the World Gold Council’s digital gold innovation programme, designed to strengthen trust, transparency and market efficiency.”

Matthias Tauber, Managing Director and Senior Partner at BCG, added:
“The question is no longer whether gold will be digital, it’s how it can participate in modern financial systems without compromising physical integrity. Together with the World Gold Council, we explored what it takes to build trusted rails for digital gold, at market scale.”

The WGC is now inviting innovators and market participants both inside and outside the gold industry to collaborate in shaping this shared infrastructure, ensuring digital gold becomes more accessible, tradeable, and integrated into tomorrow’s financial systems.