By
Godfrey Benjamin
January 22nd, 2024
A group of European banks have conducted a series of cross-border financial trades via a jointly developed blockchain-powered platform.
As it has been revealed in the announcement made by the European IBM-powered blockchain trading platform we.trade, the first series of cross-border financial trades was successfully completed through the platform. 10 firms executed 7 trade transactions across 5 countries through four banks.
IBM specialists have been working on development of the platform for over a year and now it is ready for conducting trade transactions employing blockchain technology that can be considered to be commercially viable.
The we.trade digital platform is developed on the base of the Hyperledger Fabric blockchain technology. Thanks to smart contracts, it is possible to make event-based payments automatically. As a result of a competitive bidding process that was help last year in June, IBM won the contract to offer a cloud-based platform for the project.
The list of members of the we.trade consortium includes such well-known financial establishments as UniCredit, Societe Generale, Santander, Rabobank, Nordea, Natixis, KBC, HSBC and Deutsche Bank. The consortium that was created in 2017 has an aim to provide appropriate solutions for the financing gaps that represent themselves real obstacles for both cross-border and domestic trade, especially for small and medium-scale enterprises working in Europe.
Last month, it was taken a decision to create a legal entity for we.trade with a view to provide the members of the consortium with an opportunity to offer the blockchain solution to their clients. As a result, we.trade Innovation DAC incorporated in Dublin, Ireland was formed.
At the moment, the we.trade platform is opened for users from 11 countries in Europe. The group of these countries includes the United Kingdom, Sweden, Spain, Norway, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, France, Finland, Denmark and Belgium.
Nevertheless, Roberto Mancone, the chief operating officer of we.trade, said that the joint venture would actively work on expanding its geography: “…We are delighted to have launched for the first time in the world, a blockchain based platform that enhances the overall customer experience when trading internationally. The next step will be getting buy-in from additional banks and their customers in Europe and further afield.”
The we.trade platform is not the only one innovative project implementing IBM cutting-edge technologies. In March, the company announced the launch of its low-cost blockchain platform for startups that is aimed at providing smaller scale businesses with an opportunity to learn, build and try out their own blockchain network. The platform lets them to create and test their developments.
Two month later, in May, as it has been informed by CoinSpeaker, IBM revealed its plans to join its forces and expertise with Veridium Labs in order to utilize blockchain, the distributed ledger technology for improving the efficiency in the carbon-credit market and enhancing the process of offsetting carbon credits. IBM wants to launch its own cryptocurrency on the Stellar blockchain and to tokenize carbon credits.