Blockchain Challenges

This recent Fast Company article raises some good points about the challenges that still lie in front of applying blockchain solutions to financial service industry issues. And there remain a number of rounds of innovation in front of us before many of these hurdles, whether compliance, cost or trust, are surmounted.

Ripple and Smart Token Chain are both heavily invested in seeing this mission through. We share a vision, and our solutions align philosophically, as well as technologically. The benefits are evident: Fully digitizing money drains cost from the system and allows far more efficient exchanges of value.

The other goal, speed, is also desirable, but is the harder goal to achieve. Far more regulatory and “middleman” issues arise once you offer a fast method for transferring currency. After all, once the money is moved, it is pretty darn hard to get back if a late issue arises with either account, or with the identities of the parties involved.

Fail-safes and cross-checks need to be built into the system that are thorough, ironclad and reliable, yet do not slow down the transaction.

STC’s specific blockchain approach is attractive because it offers unique identifiers for each counterparty, the monies or assets involved, and each of the stops along the way to delivery and settlement. The ability to track any aspect of a transaction to the point at issue quickly, and take corrective action, is a key value proposition.

Trust needs to build, however, and competing institutions need to agree to collaborate as much as they have on past innovations like SWIFT and ACH. As noted in the Fast Company article, the lack of a central entity driving the development of blockchain standards is slowing the adoption process.

We believe that soon there will be a tipping point, where suddenly a critical mass of participants breaks the progress logjam and speeds blockchain standards to fruition. Those that are ready to move at that point will steal the competitive advantage.

Smart Token Chain seeks to unify the many disparate blockchains coming to market with common standards for identity, while providing interoperability across these emerging systems. We look forward to growing the ecosystem to enable innovation for all our partners. If you want to join us in this crusade, please do not hesitate to reach out.