Uber tests weekend fund withdrawals, gaining 1.5 extra days of yield
Uber Technologies completed a blockchain-based cash management pilot with HSBC and Franklin Templeton, buying money market fund units on a Thursday and redeeming some on Sunday. Keeping the money invested over the weekend produced 1.5 additional days of yield compared with withdrawing it before Friday's market close.
Weekend access to invested cash
The transaction, reported by crypto.news on October 30, 2026, tested whether Uber could keep cash invested longer while retaining access to it for operational payments. The 1.5-day figure measures the difference between the reported withdrawal scenarios, not an annual yield rate or a dollar gain. The amount invested was not disclosed.
Canton Network's announcement described a purchase made through Tradeweb using HSBC tokenized deposits. Uber received units in Franklin Templeton's tokenized money market fund, with settlement on Canton and technology supplied by Fireblocks. The fund operates on Franklin Templeton's Benji platform, which was integrated with Canton in November 2025 to give institutions access to tokenized investment products, according to crypto.news.
Payment and delivery of the fund units were synchronized under a delivery-versus-payment, or DvP, arrangement. That structure reduces the risk of one party handing over money or assets without receiving what the other owes.
The two assets retain different characteristics. HSBC said its tokenized deposits represent the bank's deposit obligations in verified corporate accounts. The fund units are investments and carry risks distinct from bank deposits.
In Canton's October 30 release, Odette Rodrigues, Uber's vice president of corporate finance, treasury, and capital markets, said companies increasingly need round-the-clock access to cash. "This test is a first step towards more efficient 24/7 working capital management," she said.
Expansion plans and the pilot's limits
HSBC's global head of payments solutions, Manish Kohli, said the experiment demonstrated that tokenized deposits could support settlement at any hour. "The ability of HSBC's tokenized deposits on Canton enables seamless delivery-versus-payment settlement," he said in the Canton announcement.
Kohli also said HSBC plans to offer the treasury capability to U.S. corporate customers and add investment choices beyond Franklin Templeton's products. In reporting carried by The Hindu BusinessLine from Bloomberg, he described the technology as "now available for deployment and expansion with other customers today."
That expansion plan concerns the treasury capability tested by Uber. HSBC's broader Tokenised Deposit Service was already operating in Hong Kong, Singapore, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom, the United States and the United Arab Emirates, according to earlier crypto.news coverage. Eligible U.S. corporate and institutional customers gained access to that service in April 2026.
Franklin Templeton's director of liquidity distribution, Matt Jones, said linking funds with bank deposits could broaden the role of digital assets in corporate treasury work. "Connecting tokenized investment products with bank deposits is an important step for institutional treasury operations," he said in Canton's release.
Fireblocks CEO Michael Shaulov described Uber's transaction as a template for putting otherwise idle cash to work. He expects hundreds of major corporations and multinationals to adopt blockchain-based cash investment models within 18 months. That is a forecast, not a measure of current adoption.
Uber's transaction remains a pilot rather than evidence of universal availability. The announcement did not report how many commercial customers use the capability, the volume of transactions or measured costs relative to conventional systems.
Earlier blockchain payment experiments
Uber had explored blockchain payments before this treasury test, including through its participation in the Diem stablecoin initiative. At the Bloomberg Tech Summit in San Francisco in June 2025, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said Uber was studying stablecoins for payments and possible savings on cross-border transactions.
HSBC also conducted a separate experiment with Ant Digital Technologies in October 2026, IDNFinancials previously reported. That work tested artificial intelligence agents making micropayments with tokenized deposits in a test environment; it was distinct from Uber's corporate treasury pilot.