Fiserv launches dollar-backed token on Solana for 90 North Dakota banks

Fiserv has moved its digital asset platform into live production, with the Bank of North Dakota’s Roughrider Coin as the first transaction flowing through it. The launch puts a state-governed, dollar-backed token on Solana’s public blockchain inside the day-to-day settlement workflows of more than 90 banks and credit unions.

• Fiserv announced the platform went live on Thursday, October 1, with Roughrider Coin as its first production use case.
• More than 90 North Dakota banks and credit unions are participating, accessing the token through Fiserv’s existing Commercial Center system.
• VersaBank USA National Association handles minting, burning, custody and reserve management, while the Bank of North Dakota provides governance oversight.

• 90+ North Dakota banks and credit unions signed on at launch
• $10B Bank of North Dakota’s total assets as the only state-owned U.S. bank
• 106 yrs BND’s operating history dating back to 1919
• Oct 1 when Fiserv announced the Roughrider platform going live

North Dakota’s financial institutions now have a new route for moving dollars between each other, built on Solana rather than the ACH and wire rails they have used for decades. According to reporting by CryptoSlate, Fiserv’s October 1 announcement named Roughrider Coin as the first live use case on its digital asset platform, with participating banks reaching the token through Commercial Center, the online banking interface they already use for interbank transfers.

Fiserv announced the platform went live on October 1, with Roughrider Coin as the first production use case.

Fiserv puts Roughrider inside familiar banking workflows

Bank of North Dakota says initiation, approval and settlement of Roughrider transfers will run through the same operational channels staff already use for ACH and wire payments. That design choice is meant to let bank employees work the new rail without learning a separate blockchain interface, even though the underlying transfers settle on Solana.

Fiserv says more than 90 North Dakota banks and credit unions are participating in the rollout, a figure that describes sign-up rather than usage. How much money has actually moved through Roughrider since the October 1 launch has not been disclosed by either party.

BND positions the token for treasury transfers and loan payoffs, citing near-instant, around-the-clock settlement at lower cost than wires. The bank’s comparison materials offer indicative cost figures but no measured savings data or testing methodology.

VersaBank mints and burns tokens as dollars stay in bank accounts

According to BND’s deployment documentation, Roughrider is a permissioned asset running on Solana’s public blockchain, with participation voluntary and restricted to financial institutions. Fireblocks secures the wallets, and BND cites freeze and clawback capabilities available through Solana’s Token-2022 extensions, giving the state-owned bank a layer of control uncommon on a public chain.

VersaBank USA National Association issues the token and handles minting, burning, custody and reserve management, while Fiserv operates the platform and BND supplies governance. Each token carries one-to-one U.S. dollar backing, and minting only occurs after a confirmed transfer from an institution’s operating account into a designated “for benefit of” account.

When a token arrives at the receiving institution’s wallet, a smart-contract instruction automatically triggers burning, keeping token balances low by design. BND separately describes daily netting of account movements across VersaBank custody accounts and a concentration account held at BND, keeping token settlement and bank-account reconciliation as distinct steps.

North Dakota calls Roughrider its first stablecoin, BND calls it a deposit token

Fiserv and Bank of North Dakota describe the product differently. The original partnership announcement calls Roughrider Coin “North Dakota’s first stablecoin” and the first U.S. state stablecoin to launch on the Fiserv digital asset platform, while BND’s current deployment page refers to it as a dollar-backed token deposit.

Bank of North Dakota chief executive Don Morgan tied the launch to the bank’s long history and to a shift in federal law.

The development of the Roughrider coin reflects that commitment, capitalizes on recent changes in federal law, and ensures the continued health, resilience, and relevancy of the North Dakota financial industry for its citizens.

Don Morgan, chief executive officer, Bank of North Dakota

Fiserv, which processes roughly 90 billion transactions a year across about 10,000 financial institution clients and six million merchant locations, built Roughrider on the FIUSD digital asset platform it introduced in June 2025, and expects the token to interoperate with other coins on that platform.

The BlockWest read. The naming dispute between Fiserv’s “stablecoin” and BND’s “dollar-backed token deposit” matters more than it looks. If regulators eventually treat interbank settlement tokens as deposits rather than stablecoins, community banks get a lighter compliance path than issuers facing stablecoin-specific rules, and other state-owned banks watching North Dakota will take note of which label survives.

The open question is usage, not access. BND and Fiserv have not disclosed active-sender counts or transaction volume since the October 1 go-live, leaving it unclear whether the more than 90 enrolled banks and credit unions are routing real interbank business through Roughrider or simply holding the option in reserve.

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