Winners of the Central Banking Awards 2026 – Fourth Announcement

For immediate release: 10:00, March 19, 2026

Central Banking is pleased to announce the fourth tranche of winners of the Central Banking Awards 2026, its 13th annual industry awards recognising excellence in the central banking community. Winners include those for Digital transformation, Currency manager, Financial services, Financial markets infrastructure services – retail and Digital currency initiative. #CentralBanking2026Awards

Drawing on 36 years of independent and informed reporting, analysis, benchmarking and comment, the Central Banking Awards were judged by a panel made up of members of the Central Banking Editorial Team and Editorial Advisory Board.

A brief description follows, detailing the rationale for giving the awards as well as reaction comments from the Governor of the Bank of Mexico, the President of the Central Bank of Curaçao and Sint Maarten, the Vice-Chairman of the Public Sector Group at Citi, the Chief Revenue Officer at eCurrency and the Global Head of Account-to-Account Payments at ACI Worldwide. 

Digital transformation: Bank of Mexico

Banxico has migrated its core market systems to ADSOA, a decentralised ‘living’ architecture modelled on biological cells. The result is that parallel microservices self-repair, remove single points of failure and scale rapidly for fast auctions. Developed in‑house with local data control, ADSOA boosts operational resilience, reduces external dependencies and offers a foundation for wider central bank integration.

Victoria Rodríguez Ceja, Governor, Bank of Mexico, said:

“This award reflects our effort to building an innovative and resilient financial infrastructure, for the benefit of Mexico’s financial system and economic development. ADSOA is a key component of our digital transformation strategy that has allowed us to further strengthen our core systems and reimagine the future of our infrastructure, positioning us at the forefront of systems architecture.”

Christopher Jeffery, Chairman, Central Banking Awards Committee, said:

“Banxico’s ADSOA has delivered a robust, self‑healing infrastructure that aims to eliminate single points of failure, secures operational sovereignty and accelerates auction processing – a resilient, future‑proof model that warrants attention internationally.”

Currency manager: Central Bank of Curaçao and Sint Maarten

The CBCS’s successful introduction of the Caribbean guilder demonstrates a small team that develops and executes a well-considered plan consistently, while taking on expert advice where needed, can yield strong results. The central bank’s team took on an unpopular mandate of introducing a new currency and turned a sceptical public into one in favour of the change. Banks found the changeover to be smooth, and the banknotes’ visual designs creatively navigated potential political and cultural crunch points.

Richard Doornbosch, President, Central Bank of Curaçao and Sint Maarten, said:

“The introduction of the Caribbean guilder has been one of the CBCS’s most significant undertakings in recent history. Being selected as the recipient of Central Banking’s Currency Manager Award is a profound honour for our institution. This award shows what is possible for a small central bank when a professional and enthusiastic team is working relentlessly in close co-operation with trusted partners and advisers.”

Christopher Jeffery, Chairman, Central Banking Awards Committee, said:

“The CBCS’s success in converting scepticism into ownership through clear multilingual outreach, neutral island‑themed design and next‑generation security has strengthened monetary sovereignty and public trust.”

Financial services: Citi

Citi has striven to provide clients with high-level advice, service breadth and technical expertise during a turbulent year. The bank’s public sector group has advised central banks on a range of issues including cyber security, geopolitical risks and stablecoins and tokenisation. The group has notably delivered significant volumes of collateralised financing linked to deposits, SDRs, gold and financial securities. 

Jay Colllins, Vice-Chairman, Public Sector Group, Citi, said:

“Last year there was an explosion in collateralised instruments. These were not ‘old school’, driven by distress, but a ‘new school’ of thought – sometimes between the central bank and the ministry of finance – around how to fund more cheaply and efficiently. We’ve even seen more sophisticated transactions where collateralised structures create both a lower cost funding opportunity and are used to optimise liabilities and currencies. Governments and central banks have been collaborating much more with each other on these trades.”

Christopher Jeffery, Chairman, Central Banking Awards Committee, said: 

“The advice and expertise provided by Citi’s public sector team has helped clients to manage funding costs and boost risk-adjusted returns.” 

Digital currency initiative: eCurrency

eCurrency has acted as both an adviser and technology provider in proofs of concept and live pilots of central bank digital currencies (CBDC) across four continents – including the first national rollout with CBDC as a legal tender. Working with central banks from Jamaica to Malawi, eCurrency has helped to increase transparency, reduce friction to making retail payments faster and lower barriers to accessing digital money.  

Lars Arvidsson, Chief Revenue Officer, eCurrency, said:

“eCurrency is honoured to receive this award. We appreciate being recognised for our financial ecosystem knowledge, real-world implementation and operationalisation experience of CBDC solutions, and advisory services to central banks across four continents.”

Christopher Jeffery, Chairman, Central Banking Awards Committee, said: 

“Central bank officials have praised eCurrency’s multi-disciplinary team for its knowledge and experience identifying opportunities and addressing challenges working towards the public good.”

Financial market infrastructure services - retail: ACI Worldwide

ACI Worldwide provided the real-time technology foundation that powers the Central Bank of Colombia’s Bre-B national instant-payments scheme. This involved deploying the technology provider’s digital central infrastructure, which includes an addressing directory, real-time clearing and a centralised settlement engine. ACI Worldwide’s technology also underpins Kuwait’s real-time account-to-account payment scheme, which has gained significant traction during the period under review. 

Craig Ramsey, Global head account-to-account payments, ACI Worldwide, said: 

“This recognition from Central Banking is an incredible honour and a testament to what can be achieved through true partnership. Bre-B represents one of the most ambitious and impactful real‑time payment modernisations anywhere in the world, and we are proud to have worked alongside Banco de la República to help bring this vision to life. This award underscores the importance of building national payment infrastructures that are inclusive, interoperable and future‑ready. We are delighted to celebrate this milestone with Banco de la República and look forward to supporting the next phase of innovation.”

Christopher Jeffery, Chairman, Central Banking Awards Committee, said: 

“ACI Worldwide staff maintained an open mindset to address design challenges to help to deliver the Bre-B implementation, ensuring a highly successful launch: with more than 500 million transactions processed and 101.7 million payment keys registered.” 

Notes to Editors   

1. Media copies of the citing articles are also available. Please contact Christopher Jeffery at: chris.jeffery@centralbanking.com or + 44 (0) 20 7316 9509; or Daniel Hinge at: daniel.hinge@centralbanking.com or + 44 (0) 20 7316 9054.  
2. Please click the following links to view the Central Banking Awards 2026, Central Banking Awards 2025, Central Banking Awards 2024, Central Banking Awards 2023, Central Banking Awards 2022, Central Banking Awards 2021, Central Banking Awards 2020, Central Banking Awards 2019, Central Banking Awards 2018, Central Banking Awards 2017, Central Banking Awards 2016, Central Banking Awards 2015 and Central Banking Awards 2014.  
3. Since its foundation in 1990, Central Banking journal has been the only regular, independent publication for and about central banks. It is supported by an Editorial Advisory Board that includes the former governors of many of the world’s leading central banks, as well as Nobel Prize-winning economists. 
4. Central Banking is read by subscribers in more than 145 countries.  
5. Central Banking operates the Central Banking Institute, a membership club for central banks comprising Benchmarking, Insight and Professional Development.