According to a report by Ledger Insights, the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) opened the Digital Securities Sandbox (DSS) for applications at the end of September, relaxing certain rules for DLT market infrastructure. The two entities that have announced receiving preliminary approval are (expected) Central Securities Depository (CSD) Montis (owned by Archax) and ClearToken, the latter planning to operate as a central clearinghouse for crypto and tokenized assets. ClearToken has received support from companies such as Nomura Securities' Laser Digital and Standard Chartered's Zodia Custody.
Similar to the EU's DLT pilot regime, the DSS program will relax the requirement that exchanges and central securities depositories must always be separate (which is sometimes impractical for DLT).