Anchorage Digital said USDM1, a U.S. dollar-denominated sovereign debt instrument backed 1:1 by U.S. Treasury securities, is now available on its federally regulated custody platform, widening institutional access to blockchain-based collateral designed for trading, margin and financing workflows.
The company said the instrument allows institutional clients to hold and use sovereign, Treasury-backed collateral within round-the-clock settlement and collateral-management processes. Anchorage will provide custody, settlement, control-account and collateral-management support for the product on its regulated platform.
USDM1 is structured as a natively issued blockchain instrument rather than a wrapped or tokenized version of an existing asset, according to the companies. They said each unit represents secured sovereign debt issued under New York law and designed in the style of a Brady bond, with holders having claims secured by the underlying collateral.
The product is intended for use across derivatives, repo and broader financing markets, where institutions are looking for digital instruments that can fit within established legal and operational frameworks. Anchorage said the instrument offers bankruptcy-remote sovereign exposure with programmable settlement and U.S. close-out netting protections.
Nathan McCauley, co-founder and chief executive of Anchorage Digital, said institutions were looking for digital assets that could operate within existing legal and market structures. He said USDM1 showed how sovereign, Treasury-backed instruments could be adapted for digital financial infrastructure.
USDM1 was developed to support the Republic of the Marshall Islands’ universal basic income programme and its digital disbursement system. The Marshall Islands said the instrument was designed in part to improve the government’s ability to deliver payments across its geographically dispersed atolls.
David Paul, finance minister of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, said the digital structure could help broaden access to government financial services by reaching citizens in remote areas through a framework tied to established legal protections.
Beyond domestic payments, the instrument is also being positioned for institutional use as fully collateralised sovereign debt under New York law. The companies said it is compatible with derivatives, repo and securities-lending frameworks, giving institutions a Treasury-backed sovereign alternative to corporate-issued digital dollar products through Anchorage’s federally licensed platform.
