Hassan Maishera
TL;DR
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Solana Foundation unveiled an open-source delivery-versus-payment program on Oct. 6.
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The system settles asset delivery and payment together in one atomic transaction.
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It aims to reduce settlement delays and the risk of one party delivering without receiving payment.
Solana Targets Settlement Risk With Atomic Trades
Solana Foundation has launched Solana DvP, an open-source program designed to help institutions settle trades onchain with finality in seconds.
Delivery-versus-payment links the transfer of an asset to its corresponding payment. Under Solana’s program, both legs execute within a single atomic transaction: either the asset and payment move together, or neither transfer occurs.
That structure addresses principal risk, where one participant delivers cash or securities but fails to receive the other side of the trade.
Traditional settlement can involve several intermediaries and take one or two days, depending on the market and instrument. During that period, capital remains committed, and participants depend on the settlement process completing successfully.
Solana DvP aims to shorten that window by coordinating the exchange directly on public blockchain infrastructure.
The program also seeks to simplify how institutions arrange onchain settlement. Rather than commissioning a separate smart contract for each transaction, participants can use a common, open-source implementation across the Solana ecosystem.
Catherine Gu, head of product for digital assets at Solana Foundation, described the program as an open standard that combines public infrastructure with settlement finality measured in seconds.
A reusable program could reduce the development work required for individual deals and make recurring transactions easier to support.
Atomic execution addresses the risk of an incomplete exchange, although it does not remove every risk associated with the underlying assets, software or counterparties. Its central benefit is ensuring that the two onchain settlement legs complete together.
J.P. Morgan Contributes Settlement Expertise
J.P. Morgan contributed settlement expertise to help shape the program’s institutional requirements.
Its input covered transaction deadlines, escrow isolation, and compatibility with features used by regulated token issuers.
These include pausable tokens and transfer hooks under Solana’s Token-2022 standard. Pausable tokens allow authorized administrators to halt transfers when required, while transfer hooks support additional logic around token movements.
Accommodating those features matters for assets whose issuers impose operational or compliance controls. Institutional settlement infrastructure needs to function alongside those restrictions rather than assume every token transfers without conditions.
Rhodel D’Souza, head of markets digital assets at J.P. Morgan, said shared infrastructure for atomic delivery-versus-payment is important for institutions seeking to operate at scale while managing settlement exposure.
Tokenized Assets Provide an Immediate Use Case
The launch builds on institutional tokenization activity already taking place on Solana.
One example is a J.P. Morgan–arranged commercial paper transaction for Galaxy Digital that settled in USDC. A reusable DvP program could help make similar transactions less dependent on bespoke infrastructure.
Solana’s effort also joins a broader range of blockchain settlement projects.
J.P. Morgan’s Kinexys has tested a cross-chain DvP transaction with Ondo Finance, connecting its permissioned payments infrastructure to the public Ondo Chain testnet.
ClearToken has likewise introduced DvP settlement through permissioned, regulated applications running on Canton Network.
Solana Foundation’s approach emphasizes an open implementation operating on public infrastructure, offering institutions another model for coordinating asset and payment transfers.
Solana Foundation says the DvP program has passed external security audits and is ready to handle real funds.
Confidentiality features are planned, however, and are not presented as part of the completed launch.
That distinction matters for institutional adoption. Participants may require settlement details to remain private even when transactions use shared blockchain infrastructure.
Institutions highlighted privacy as an important adoption requirement at Consensus Hong Kong earlier this year. Solana DvP now provides the settlement framework, with planned privacy capabilities representing a further step toward meeting those needs.
