JPMorgan activated its tokenized deposit product, JPM Coin (JPMD), on the Ethereum (ETH) mainnet on October 19, moving dollar-denominated deposits that had previously run only on Base — a Layer 2 network — onto the base settlement chain itself, according to COINOTAG.

The product converts deposits held at the bank into tokens that can move across blockchain rails. By extending JPMD to Ethereum's base layer, the bank has broadened the network footprint of the instrument beyond the secondary scaling environment where it had operated exclusively until now.

A Bank-Issued Deposit Token on Public Infrastructure

Tokenized deposits are blockchain-based representations of commercial bank money. Unlike stablecoins, which are generally issued by nonbank entities and backed by segregated reserves, deposit tokens remain liabilities on the issuing bank's balance sheet, keeping the funds within the regulated banking perimeter while enabling transfers over blockchain infrastructure around the clock. Because the token is a claim on deposits at JPMorgan, its use remains tied to the bank's client relationships, even though the network beneath it is open and permissionless. That structural difference now plays out on shared ground: Ethereum's mainnet is among the most widely used public networks for stablecoins, so the October 19 activation puts the two dollar-token models side by side on the same base chain.

JPMorgan, the largest bank in the United States by assets, first unveiled JPM Coin in 2019 as one of the earliest dollar tokens issued by a major bank, using it for wholesale client payments on permissioned ledgers. That work has since been carried forward by the bank's blockchain unit, Kinexys, which has extended the deposit-token model to public networks. The progression from permissioned ledgers to Base and now to Ethereum's base layer illustrates the bank's step-by-step shift of deposit-token operations from closed ledgers to open networks.

Base, the network where JPMD had operated exclusively before the October 19 expansion, is an Ethereum Layer 2 incubated by Coinbase that processes transactions off-chain before settling them on Ethereum. With the mainnet activation, JPMD now runs directly on the underlying settlement layer itself, meaning transfers are executed and settled on Ethereum without an off-chain processing layer in between.

The original report was first published on COINOTAG: JPMorgan Extends Tokenized Deposit JPMD to Ethereum (ETH) Mainnet on October 19