White Paper: IBM & FinExtra

A new paper produced by Finextra in association with IBM explores the progression of blockchain – the shared ledger technology which allows any participant in a business network to see the system of record – towards an industrial solution for financial services.

While opinions vary as to the way in which blockchain will impact financial services, the extent to which it will disrupt the existing ecosystem and the speed at which this will happen, there is widespread agreement that the technology has powerful potential to herald a new age of efficiency in the industry.

Leveraging Finextra’s in-depth interviews with a broad range of senior blockchain experts from banks and technology providers, the new paper explores this potential, examining:

• What blockchain is and why everyone is talking about it
• The potential applications of blockchain in financial services
• The current completeness of the blockchain technology stack
• The factors that might prevent blockchain from going mainstream and how they are being tackled
• The timeframe for blockchain to become an industrial solution for financial services
• What financial institutions should be doing about blockchain right now

The paper establishes the current state of play with blockchain in financial services, looking at the challenges and opportunities of implementing the technology across banking and the capital markets, and examining a number of use cases and proofs of concept already under way. To benefit from the insights of a wide range of industry experts on blockchain, please complete the short form below to download the paper.