The majority of financial institutions expect to see mainstream adoption of blockchain technology by 2020, while nearly half of the financial institutions are already investing or planning to during 2017.
It was found that 33 percent of those involved in the survey expect to see commercial blockchain adoption by 2018, and the majority say they foresee mainstream adoption by 2020.
Findings indicated that the blockchain roll out would be a priority within business areas where transparency would be improved, processes automated, and time saved on settlements and transactions. Many banks are already forming partnerships with others to accelerate blockchain development.
According to the study, 69 percent of banks are already experimenting with permissioned blockchains; this is when a network is allowed to appoint a group of participants to have control of the validation process. In addition to this, half of banks are now working with a FinTech start-up or technology company to augment the capabilities of the technology.
The top five use cases expected to go to production are cross border payments, digital identity management, clearing and settlement, letter of credit process and the syndication of loans.
Read more: EU watchdog warns banks of blockchain security risks.
Indicating the importance with which blockchain technology is being viewed, 51 percent of executives spearheading blockchain initiatives are either Chief Technology Officers or Chief Innovation Officers.
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Sanat Rao, Chief Business Officer and Global Head at Finacle said: “This research reaffirms our belief that the blockchain technology has potential to help banks reimagine banking processes. The technology can help banks automate inter-organization processes, significantly improve transparency and reset existing operational benchmarks.”
In line with the predictions of mass use by 2020, Sanat Rao has said that: “Several progressive organizations have already executed pilots to validate these propositions. We believe, in the coming quarters, the industry will experience greater momentum towards rolling out lab-pilots to real-life use cases.”
The study was carried out by Infosys Finacle and Let’s Talk Payments (LTP) and it is entitled “Blockchain Technology: From Hype to Reality”. The intention of the study was to ascertain the sentiment toward blockchain technology on levels of understanding, adoption strategies and opportunities and challenges.
