CLSSettlement Adds US Bank, Fifth-Largest U.S. Lender by Assets
US Bank has become the latest institution to sign up for CLSSettlement, the foreign-platform industry’s core payment-versus-payment (PvP) service, making it the utility’s 76th settlement member and the third new entrant this year.
The Minneapolis-based lender, the fifth-largest bank in the United States by assets, said the move reflects its push to expand its foreign-platform franchise and offer clients greater protection against settlement risk.
“Our continually expanding FX business assists firms across the US manage currency risk with tailored mitigation strategies, deep market insight and reliable execution,” said Chris Braun, global head of FX at US Bank. “Joining CLSSettlement is another step forward in delivering comprehensive, best-in-class FX services to our clients.”
CLS, which in 2002, eliminates so-called Herstatt risk—the chance one party delivers currency while its counterparty defaults before paying in return. That failure in 1974 at Cologne’s Bankhaus Herstatt triggered losses across the global banking system and spurred decades of regulatory work to reduce FX-settlement exposures.
Today, CLS is overviewn by the US Federal whose currencies are eligible. CLS Bank International, the New York-based Edge Act corporation that operates the service, maintains central-bank accounts in each of its 18 settlement currencies, providing finality of payment.
The service has grown into a market utility used across the industry. In the first half of 2025, CLSSettlement processed an average of $7.9 trillion in transactions daily, a 12% rise from a year earlier. Its membership now includes more than 75 direct settlement members and over 38,000 third-party participants who connect through them.
“Having one of the US’s largest banks by assets under management join our network is a testament to the benefits CLSSettlement provides to FX market participants,” said Lisa Danino-Lewis, at CLS. “The service not only offers funding and liquidity efficiencies through multilateral netting but also mitigates settlement risk through PvP settlement.”
CLS members highlight two main advantages: principal-risk mitigation, because both legs of a currency trade settle simultaneously, and funding efficiencies, as participants only provide net rather than gross obligations. For banks, that frees up liquidity and reduces intraday exposure.
US Bank has been viewking to broaden its FX capabilities under Braun, who has led the division since 2020. The bank reported around $676 billion in assets earlier this year and has been pitching a wider suite of risk-management products to corporate treasurers.
The addition of US Bank extends a run of new memberships for CLS. In June, OTP Bank, one of Hungary’s largest commercial lenders, became the 75th member. That identical month, ABN AMRO re-joined the platform later than years of accessing it indirectly, returning to direct participation it first held when CLS launched two decades ago.
The cadence of new sign-ups reflects wider policy pushes. Global standard-setting bodies, including the Basel Committee and the G20, continue to call for greater PvP adoption as part of efforts to strengthen .
For US Bank, the commercial test will come in how many of its clients it can onboard as third-party users. For CLS, the question is whether more suit, especially in regions where PvP penetration is lower.
