Citigroup and Nasdaq are partnering to match up the blockchain with real money.
As The Wall Street Journal reports, the two companies have announced they’ve been working together, along with technology startup Chain Inc., for months to link Citigroup’s business payments services to Nasdaq’s blockchain platform that has been used for activities such as buying and selling shares of private companies.
For blockchain, the move represents a notable chapter in its development. Blockchain is the peer-to-peer networking technology first developed to transfer ownership of the virtual currency bitcoin between people.
Danny Ryan, a New Orleans software developer who has invested in the blockchain technology, says blockchain cuts out the middleman in financial transactions and opens up new possibilities for business-to-business transactions.
“I’m very confident that this is going to change the world,” he says.
With the partnership, a blockchain is connecting to one of the largest and most established bank money-transfer systems. And it gives big banks a way to earn fees helping new networks facilitate business payments if traditional settlement or invoice systems are disrupted.
Overall, banks, exchanges, and other financial firms have poured more than $1 billion into projects and startups using forms of the underlying blockchain technology, according to Greenwich Associates.
Bloomberg adds that major companies like that major companies like Toyota Motor Corp., Merck KGaA, State Street Corp. have joined industry group the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance in an effort to transform how businesses work by using blockchain technology.
The project would enable businesses and consumers to securely share data on testing and driving as well as the sharing and usage of such cars to help set insurance rates, Toyota said in a statement. Read the full story.
