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Banks Adopting Blockchain 'Dramatically Faster' Than Expected (reuters.com)
Banks and other financial institutions are adopting blockchain technology "dramatically faster" than initially expected, with 15 percent of top global banks intending to roll out full-scale, commercial blockchain products in 2017, IBM said on Wednesday. Reuters reports: The technology company said 65 percent of banks expected to have blockchain projects in production in three years' time, with larger banks -- those with more than 100,000 employees -- leading the charge. IBM, whose findings were based on a survey of 200 banks, said the areas most commonly identified by lenders as ripe for blockchain-based innovation were clearing and settlement, wholesale payments, equity and debt issuance and reference data. Blockchain, which originates from digital currency bitcoin, works as an electronic transaction-processing and record-keeping system that allows all parties to track information through a secure network, with no need for third-party verification.
IBM is using blockchain as a distributed, digital ledger service. The basic idea is to create new blockchains for different domains (think of Bitcoin as a blockchain for digital currency) and the use those within a community as ledgers to track transactions (for example, all real estate transactions could be added to the real estate blockchain). They're developing ways to also include rules for transactions to only allow updates to the chain if certain conditions are met.
Source: I sat through many presentations on this at IBM Edge last week.
I'd type more, but I'm on my phone... Google IBM and blockchain to see more. It's actually pretty interesting.
This is nothing to do with bitcoin or any other pretend e-currency, it's a distributed ledger system for tracking transactions between banks I believe.
It's supposed to replace the current EFT systems between banks, which are the electronic equivalent of a pile of rubber-banded cheques stuffed in a postpack.