SocGen issues green euro-denominated bond on Ethereum

Societe Generale announced Monday that it issued its first green bond on the Ethereum blockchain.

The transaction — which took place in late November — amounts to 10 million euros, or roughly $10.8 million, and has a maturity of three years.

The tokenized bonds, France’s third-largest bank wrote, will ensure “increased transparency and traceability as well as improved fluidity and speed in transactions and settlements.”

According to a press release, SocGen aims to enable more transparency on ESG by using the blockchain as a “data repository and certification tool for issuers and investors.”

The smart contract of the bond includes carbon footprint information, and is available for anyone to access.

Societe Generale-FORGE, the bank’s crypto team, released a report focused on the lifecycle of security tokens back in November.

In partnership with the Lamarck Group, Institut Louis Bachelier and the Crypto Carbon Ratings Institute, the report sought to develop a methodology to calculate “the carbon footprint of a financial product issued in the form of a token on the Ethereum public blockchain infrastructure.”

It specifically used Ethereum’s network due to the “relatively low greenhouse gas emissions” due to the Merge, which took place in September of last year.

Back in June, the European Investment Bank also issued a tokenized bond, though it used Credit Agricole CIB and SEB’s bond platform built on blockchain technology. The EIB’s bond was structured as a Swedish Krona 1 billion bond, which amounts to roughly $95 million, and has a 2 year maturity.

While the bond is a first for SocGen, it previously collaborated with the EIB on the bank’s first digital bond issuance, which took place back in 2021.

Aside from collaborations, the French bank has proven to be interested in crypto.

Back in April, SocGen’s FORGE team announced its plans for a euro-pegged stablecoin dubbed EUR CoinVertible on the Ethereum blockchain.

The same team also secured a license to operate as a digital asset service provider in France back in July. It registered with the French stock market regulator as a digital asset custodian back in 2022.

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