Leading Swiss financial, technological, academic and legal industry players have come together to form a new associative body – the Capital Markets and Technology Association (CMTA) – to facilitate the use of blockchain technology in financial markets.

CMTA has been established by Lenz & Staehelin, Switzerland's largest law firm; Swissquote Bank Ltd, the Swiss leader in online banking; and Temenos, a Swiss market leader in banking software, as a not-for-profit, non-governmental association, capable of assuming an independent role as standard-setter. It has its registered office in Geneva, Switzerland.

CMTA was discussed and its concepts refined in the framework of the Center for Digital Trust at EPFL. Jacques Iffland, partner at Lenz & Staehelin, has been appointed as the chair of the newly formed association.

"The blockchain technology has the potential to reduce the complexity of the capital markets system and lower the barrier of entry for start-ups. The current lack of legal certainty is slowing – and potentially compromising – its development in this field. By defining a set of industry-supported, open standards, the CMTA aims to facilitate access to funding for businesses, ultimately contributing to value creation throughout the economy", Iffland said.

According to the official release, the CMTA will work towards creating open standards and toolkits that can be used by new or established companies, businesses and start-ups to access funding and raise capital securely and efficiently, using new technologies and leveraging digitalisation. The website describes CMTA as:

“An independent association formed by leading actors from Switzerland's financial, technological and legal sectors to create common standards around issuing, distributing and trading securities in the form of tokens using the distributed ledger technology.”