A digitised carbon token has been created to trade on Hub Culture’s new Ultra Exchange.

Bermudian-headquartered Hub Culture, which manages the world’s first digital currency, Ven, among a number of other functions, announced the token at the Transition Monaco Forum.

The token is called Ultra Carbon, and it enables real-time peer-to-peer exchange of a digital carbon asset.

The concept of carbon tokens is to expand the verifiable ecosystem of carbon credits, where producers of carbon pollution and other pollutants can offset their emissions — effectively reducing their carbon footprint — by purchasing carbon credits which are then retired.

In this case, carbon-backed tokens are generated by buying carbon credits and enabling the tokenised value to be tradable by secondary buyers.

Credits are generated by environmentally friendly businesses and organisations such as those involved in creating green energy, for example solar and wind farms, or actively drawing carbon out of the atmosphere, such as tree-planting and other CO? sequestration methods.

Tokenisation is seen as a way of increasing net demand for credits while enabling holders to enjoy liquidity and convertibility in easier to use formats and quantities.

The two-day forum in Monaco was being held for the first time, bringing together business leaders, investors, policymakers, clean-tech experts and innovators dedicated to financing ecological and energy transition and developing sustainability. Prince Albert II of Monaco was among the event speakers.

Announcing Ultra Carbon, Hub Culture said the token will be structured in a similar way to the Ven currency. In a statement it said: “It features 100 per cent asset backing of the tokenised asset, with underlying value reserves linked to both depreciating ICE EUA carbon futures and appreciating real world carbon assets, including carbon storage mechanisms like forests.

“Carbon assets are a current feature of the asset backing reserve for Ven, which features about 7 per cent carbon in its genetic make-up.”

The token can be issued and traded through a network of Hub Culture authorities, companies and organisations who can issue tokenised assets through Ultra. They can be used in peer-to-peer exchange, buying and selling, and soon will trade in pairs against more than a dozen tokenised fiat currencies.

Stan Stalnaker, founder and chief strategy officer of Hub Culture, said: “Ultra Carbon brings carbon to life for anyone with access to the internet, making it very easy to obtain and trade a carbon TAO [tokenised asset offering]. We are delivering new mechanisms to scale funding for climate by bringing more liquidity sources to the global carbon markets, both at the institutional level and the level of families and consumers who care about their carbon impacts.

“As the first tokenised asset on the Ultra system, Ultra Carbon is the premier unit in a coming range of TAOs that can be easily converted using Ven as a base interchange value translator.”

Mr Stalnaker added: “The ease and simplicity of a purchase, with cloud security, instant execution and delivery, and global compatibility, furthers carbon as an asset class. This makes carbon more useful and meaningful for everyone, especially smaller businesses who want to hold carbon as an asset but who don’t have access to the institutional carbon trading markets.”

Ultra Exchange went live last month and is the first digital asset exchange that islanders can sign up to. It is trading a limited number of cryptocurrencies until new licences are issued when the Digital Asset Business Act 2018 comes into force. The legislation has been passed by Parliament and is awaiting the assent of the Governor and a notice of the Minister of Finance.

Hub Culture, which domiciled in Bermuda in 2006, said that companies and regular individuals with HubID verification and domiciled from approved jurisdictions are able to buy, hold or sell Ultra Carbon. Insured reserves for Ultra Carbon are also available for institutional level clients.

Hub Culture has a website at https://hubculture.com/