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Saudi Arabia Monetary Authority Injects Liquidity into Local Banks Using Blockchain Technology

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On 8 June, the Saudi Arabia Monetary Authority (SAMA) announced that it had transferred funds to domestic banks through blockchain technology. The money was part of the central bank’s effort to inject SAR 50 billion ($13.3 billion) of liquidity into the country’s banking system announced last week.

According to the statement, the use of distributed ledger technology in the financial sector is part of the authority’s efforts to explore and experiment with various upcoming technologies. Indeed, the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority is inclined to twiddle with any upcoming technology in order to keep pace with emerging global technology trends. The statement reads:

“SAMA is one of the pioneer central banks to experiment with blockchain technology for money transfers, this move was one of the key innovative initiatives launched by SAMA in its program to enable and develop Fintech in the Kingdom. This includes, among others: The Fintech Saudi Initiative in cooperation with the Capital Market Authority, the introduction of SAMA Regulatory Sandbox, and an array of digital banking services and payments.“

 

 

The adoption of blockchain technology in the finance sector is surging in the entire Middle-East region. Notably, earlier in the year, SAMA and the central bank of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) disclosed a joint digital currency dubbed Aber, that would be distributed in the local banks in the to Arabian nations.

Saudi Arabia Monetary Authority to explore emerging trends 

Furthermore, the latest move by the Saudi Arabia Monetary Authority is a big declaration by the authority to the growing use of blockchain technology by central banks all over the world. Blockchain technology is known for its security and transparency traits, which SAMA experienced in the banking liquidation exercise.

In conclusion, the adoption of blockchain technology has been adopted by different central banks and financial institutions across the world. Just recently, a bank in Turkey successfully completed its first trade finance transaction using blockchain technology. Moreover, nearly 40 percent of fintech firms based in Hong Kong leverage blockchain technology.

Blockchain Voting System to Determine Russia’s Next President

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The citizens of Moscow will be able to decide whether or not Vladimir Putin stays in power for some more 12 years using a blockchain voting system. Only two regions have been confirmed to use the blockchain-powered electronic voting system, Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod.

In March, Russian lawmakers approved adjustments in the constitution that would allow Vladimir Putin to lengthen his presidency for two more six-year terms. However, the public’s constitutional amendment has to be ratified in the next voting slated to take place on July 1.

Blockchain voting system is “almost impossible to hack”

Back in 2019, a blockchain-powered e-voting system was launched in Russia. Just a month before the poll exercise, a French security researcher unearthed a severe weakness on the system, which raised doubts about the technology’s trustworthiness. Experts claimed that the old system could be compromised in less than 20 minutes using openly available software on typical computers.

Nevertheless, the Central Election Commission (CEC) reviewed the use case of the technology for the upcoming elections on a case by case basis. As per the announcement, the blockchain voting system will encrypt and conceal every vote to protect the identity and immutability of data. As a single server does not host the blockchain, making the electronic voting system is “almost impossible to hack.”

“The safety and transparency of electronic voting will be ensured by blockchain technology. Such a network does not have a single server: in order to change the information regarding bulletins, it is necessary to obtain the approval of most network participants, so the chain is almost impossible to hack. The vote itself is anonymized and encrypted.”

Blockchain technology for safety, anonymity, and satisfaction

The blockchain voting system boosts anonymity features that have led most governments to opt for it. Furthermore, the technology has the capability of accommodating multiple users at once. According to the announcement, the voting system will accommodate up to 10 million voters at once.

Digital Mortgage Platform Under Development by Bank of Russia

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The Bank of Russia is reportedly creating a digital mortgage network based on a locally built blockchain platform dubbed Masterchain, as per state-owned media outlet Ria on May 28. According to the first Deputy Governor of the Bank, the blockchain platform has recently begun to support mortgages, which is the cornerstone of the impending platform.

The Russian Central Bank has already sent its proposal for a Digital Mortgage Platform to the Government of Russia and the Federal Service for State Registration, Cadastre, and Cartography (Rosreestr).

In fact, the domestic blockchain platform is the first to be validated by the Federal Security Service or the FSB. Previous reports say that the platform is an approved Ethereum-based blockchain platform built back in 2017 by the FinTech Association, which is under the jurisdiction of the Bank of Russia.

Furthermore, this is not the first time that the country’s blockchain platform has been used for the digital mortgage platform. Approximately two years ago, a Russian-based subsidiary of Raiffeisen Bank International reportedly provided mortgage documents with information on the parties concerned, the amount and duration of the mortgage, the property involved in the Masterchain Decentralized Depositary System (DDS).

Digital mortgage platform signals  Russia is blockchain-friendly

Although the country’s central bank has blockchain-based ambitions, the Russian government has been maleficent towards digital currencies. In fact, the Russian legislature recently proposed a fine of up to 2 million rubles ($27,800); and up to seven years imprisonment for the trading of cryptocurrencies. 

Moreover, Russia’s Sberbank recently purchased 5,000 blockchain-based touchless ATMs. This is another signal that the country is a massive supporter of blockchain technology; although it is opposed to the idea of digital currencies.

Meanwhile, the Duma is getting ready for a bill on Russia’s first cryptocurrency regulation bill. The draft has been pending until last week until a second draft was rolled-out on top of other laws. 

Thailand to Leverage Blockchain to Promote Use of Green Energy

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Australian blockchain company Power Ledger is teaming up with Thailand to leverage blockchain technology to set up a digital energy company in the Asian nation. Power Ledger announced on 25 May a new partnership with Thai Digital Energy Development (TDED) – a public-private joint venture – to develop Thailand ‘s digital energy platform.

The new platform will make it easier for environmental commodities and peer-to-peer energy trading to promote the adoption of renewable energy sources. Indeed, by 2037, the country plans to produce 25% of its electricity from renewable energy sources.

Thailand leverages blockchain to advocate the use of green energy

TDED is a joint venture between a public agency, Thai energy authorities, and a private renewable energy company named BCPG. Collaboration with the Australian blockchain firm will take advantage of the blockchain technology used by BCPG; run four of its clean power projects, such as energy and carbon management; and run 12MW Smart Campus at Chiang Mai University.

In addition, Power Ledger’s transactive energy solution, based on blockchain, includes P2P energy trading and virtual power plants, as well as the use of renewable energy certificates (REC) and carbon credits for trading. Indeed, Power Ledger and BCPG have been working together for about two years now, and have even set up a similar peer-to-peer energy trading trial within Bangkok ‘s central confines.

Partnership structure open for new partners in the energy business to join

Furthermore, Power Ledger is also keen to leverage the BCPG partnership structure to reach other energy market participants in Thailand, who may be interested to use its energy trading technology based on blockchain. 

Later this year, the Australian blockchain firm will introduce its TraceX REC trading platform giving carbon credits and RECs traders a market place. In addition, the platform will facilitate P2P trading for individuals who both generate and use energy; and sell excessive energy within their locality.

Blockchain Payments System Being Launched in Cambodia

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Southeast Asian nation, Cambodia is launching a blockchain payments system to enhance the use of the country’s fiat currency. The new blockchain network is set to improve the use of the country’s local fiat currency, scaling down the use of the United States dollar.

Moreover, the new blockchain payments system will enable real-time payments, and scaling down the nation’s cost of payment massively. Nevertheless, the new payments network will have several benefits, but bringing down the over-reliance in the U.S dollar is the key objective.

90% of local payments in Cambodia are in USD

According to the assistant governor of Cambodia’s central bank, Serey Chea during a recent event, the United States dollar accounts for more than 90 percent of local payments. In addition, he claims that the huge reliance on the dollar makes Cambodia one of the most dollar-dependent economies on the planet.

Nevertheless, the new blockchain payments system is Cambodia’s biggest chance of reducing the over-reliance on the dollar, which the central bank intends to use fully. Additionally, the assisted governor noted that the central bank intends to launch the DLT network later in the year, “hopefully very soon.” 

The new blockchain-based payments network aims to bring together banks, digital wallet platforms, facilitating transactions between users and their preferred platforms, and among themselves. 

All financial institutions to join the blockchain payments system

At the moment, the payments system has 12 of Cambodia’s top financial institutions. However, the assistant governor expressed a lot of confidence in all financial service providers joining the new blockchain payments system. 

Moving forward, the blockchain system will also expand to foreign soils, with money transfer services expanding to the neighbouring country of Malaysia. More than 300,000 Cambodia citizens work in Malaysia, and they transfer funds to their home country every month. Transferring the funds is very expensive, and the blockchain payments system is expected to bring this cost down massively.

First Blockchain Iron Ore Transaction Initiated by BHP Group

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Chinese steel mills aim to gain a greater say in the iron ore business by preferring Yuan-based settlements. On 13 May, the major mining company, BHP Group announced that it had completed its first vending of iron ore to Chinese Iron and Steel company, Baosteel, using Chinese currency. As per the announcement, the first blockchain iron ore transaction is set to between BHP and Baosteel will be completed soon.

Baoshan Iron and Steel Co Ltd (Baosteel) is a part of China Baowu Steel Group. Following the company’s successful Yuan purchase deals with Brazil-based Vale and Australia’s BHP Group earlier, the Chinese firm settled a 100 million yuan with mining company Rio Tinto Plc using blockchain technology. 

First blockchain iron ore transaction worth $14.1 million (100 million yuan)

Early in January, Baosteel successfully closed a deal worth 330 million yuan of iron ore, with Brazil mining outfit Vale in the denomination of yuan.  The first blockchain iron ore transaction between BHP and Baosteel reached back in April, is worth 100 million yuan.

In fact, China is the world’s largest consumer of iron ore. Back in 2019, the country purchased 1 billion tonnes of steel-making raw materials as it seeks to procure more influence in the pricing of iron ores. The operational director of Dididsteel, Zhang Tieshan, anticipates that more deals to be inked using the Chinese yuan; as China accounts for a large percentage of iron consumption.

“China Baowu is not only China’s largest steel-maker, but also a pioneer in state-of-the-art technology application. Exploring the possibilities of yuan-denominated settlement via blockchain is a new proof,”  Zhang stated.

Baosteel advocating for yuan settlements in iron ore trade

Baosteel has been advocating for yuan-denominated settlements in the iron ore trade since 2019. The Chinese company announced back in February that it had completed deals amounting to 240 million yuan in iron ore with foreign dealers in South Africa and Ukraine.

Chinese iron ore imports surged by over 11% back in April as compared to a month earlier; as Chinese steel mills rushed to rejuvenate the production rate following the damages and disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Blockchain-based Identity System for Autonomous Vehicles to be Introduced in South Korea

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The South Korean government’s test center for key smart city fixes, Sejong City, announced on May 8 that it will launch a blockchain-based identity system for self-driving cars.

According to Asian publication Aju Business Daily, the country’s Ministry of Science and ICT will oversee the creation of a blockchain-based identity system alongside the nation’s cybersecurity watchdog, Korea‘s Internet & Security Agency. Per the smart city’s spokesperson, the blockchain system will greatly enhance data integrity by reinforcing the protection of information transmitted by vehicles and their command center.

Blockchain-based identity system to curb possible replication of autonomous automobile

Despite the fact that self-driving cars are far from being orthodox, Sejong smart city has so far commenced preparations to curb crimes linked to such technological expansion. The tech arm of the LG group, LG CNS, will collaborate with a Korea-based self-driving shuttle maker and the administration of the Sejong smart city to create an encrypted identifier called the Decentralized Identifier or DID. 

DID could aid in averting replication of autonomous vehicles and hacking into their system. As per the dispatch, the blockchain-based identity system will base several blankets of encryption to the information being transmitted between vehicles and the facilities on highways with the help of  “vehicle-to-everything”, or V2X, communication.

South Korea is at the forefront of blockchain-based innovations

The administration of the Asian country has displayed a huge interest in the blockchain technology and its deployment in key sectors in the economy. Last month, South Korea’s administration declared that tech as a “golden opportunity” and advocated for commercial enterprises to adopt it in future developments and innovations.

Despite championing blockchain technology, the country’s administration was formerly unsettled on digital currencies, it has displayed compatible attempts to vindicate digital currencies and establish a suitable regulatory framework.

Nasdaq collaborates with Blockchain Firm R3 for Digital Asset Management

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The US stock exchange Nasdaq has entered into a long-term collaboration agreement with the enterprise blockchain firm R3, to create a full-spectrum digital asset marketplace.

According to a press release on Wednesday (April 29, 2020), with a technology agreement with the R3 blockchain software firm, Nasdag will use the Corda Blockchain R3 to build its market technology business.R3’s Corda is an open-source blockchain platform that enables users to create decentralized applications (dApps). The new collaboration aim is to provide businesses with an easily accessible, comprehensive solution for issuing tokens and building trusted digital asset markets.

Commenting on the partnership Johan Toll, Head of Digital Assets at Nasdaq, said,

“This new relationship between Nasdaq and R3 will play an important role in Nasdaq’s continuous development of solutions and services that support the creation and growth of dynamic, trusted digital asset marketplaces”

Nasdaq is currently providing market infrastructure solutions to more than 120 + marketplaces, central securities and regulators, clearinghouses, and many digital asset exchanges. The R3 collaboration will accelerate Nasdaq’s efforts to help marketplaces for digital assets enhance transparency requirements to compete with their peers on the capital markets.

 According to Cathy Minter, Chief Revenue Officer, R3 said:

“Financial institutions are becoming increasingly aware of the huge potential for servicing the needs of digital assets. We can help them accommodate these assets with solutions that are designed for more secure, reliable, and regulated environments. Together with Nasdaq we will provide a world-class platform on which digital asset markets can be built, helping to rapidly accelerate the growth of these markets and others around the globe.”

As a technology provider for the capital markets, Nasdaq has early implemented blockchain across various ventures and proof of concepts that have embraced distributed ledger technologies. In January last year, Nasdaq started working with 7 different cryptocurrency exchanges by offering them proprietary market surveillance technology to improve the transparency standard.

Crypto exchanges were required to pass the Nasdaq-prepared test in order to qualify for the partnership and use of surveillance technology. According to the reports, only seven exchanges could pass the test. The proprietary market surveillance technology from Nasdaq scans for fraudulent trade patterns to ensure the volume of trading is free from fraud and manipulation

IBM launches ‘Rapid Supplier Connect,’ a Blockchain Solution to Fight COVID-19 Critical Goods Supply Chain Shortages

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IBM recently announced the launch of IBM Rapid Supplier Connect, a blockchain-based network designed to support healthcare organizations and government agencies to quickly identify and bring on board non-traditional suppliers who have volunteered to address the shortage of equipment, medical supplies needed for COVID-19 relief efforts.

The network is also designed to help speed up the screening and on-boarding process for new vendors, plus it can monitor surplus inventory and help decide where it should best be used. Rapid Supplier Connect is accessible to qualified buyers and suppliers in the United States and Canada at no cost until August 31, 2020.

Suppliers, buyers, hospitals, and many others are joining the network at the present. Northwell Health New York’s largest healthcare provider, responsible for more than 800 hospitals in New York State, has joined the Rapid Supplier Connect blockchain network. And the Worldwide Supply Chain Federation has also joined the network, bringing in over 200 American suppliers from its 3,000 members of the global community.

Phyllis McCready, VP, and chief procurement officer at Northwell Health said

“Northwell Health has had adequate supplies to protect patients and our staff during the increase in New York COVID-19 patient cases,”  He added, “It is through creating our own GPOs and supply chain, and joining forces with non-traditional suppliers that we have maintained an adequate stockpile of PPE and other equipment and supplies, so we are pleased to join IBM Rapid Supplier Connect.”

As the COVID-19 threat spreads, a true insight into a complex and uncertain supply chain is never easy with challenges from the present situation. IBM Rapid Supplier Connect is developed in conjunction with Trust Your Supplier Blockchain-based Identity Platform designed by Chainyard, IBM’s own Supply Chain, and Sterling Inventory Visibility Services. Project N95, Dun & Bradstreet, RapidRatings, KYC SiteScan, and Thomson Reuters will also support the platform with other functionalities.

Last month, together with other leading players such as Amazon, Google, and Microsoft, IBM launched the “Covid-19 High-Performance Computing Consortium” to pool an ‘unprecedented’ amount of computing power to ‘help researchers better understand Covid-19, its treatments, and potential cures everywhere.’

China’s Blockchain Services Network ‘ChinaChain’ Launches for the Public

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China’s dominance in cryptocurrency has been shown over the last few months as the country set out to create a completely new framework for decentralized applications and blockchain networks. The main focus of the country was to create its native blockchain network, which came to fruition last weekend.

On April 25, the country launched the Blockchain Services Network [BSN] for commercial purposes, both locally and globally. The blockchain network will be called ‘ChinaChain,’ a not so subtle way to indicate the presence of the country in the ecosystem.

The BSN will work as a cross-portal, cross-framework, cross-cloud global network primarily used to launch a myriad of blockchain applications. News about the BSN has been circulating for more than a year now, with rigorous testing having started 6 months ago.

The government revealed the complete system at a virtual press conference, taking precautions to avoid the spread of a highly contagious coronavirus. Official releases confirm that the launch and internal functioning of the BSN were all mandated by the authoritarian Chinese government.

Zhiguang Shan, Chairman of the BSN Development Association, claimed that the new system would act as a centerpiece for a variety of blockchain platforms. There are plans to integrate popular blockchain platforms like WeBank’s FISCO BCOS, Baidu’s Xuperchain, EOS, Ethereum and Hyperledger Fabric. The technical paper of the BSN stated:

“The main goal of the BSN has always been to create a public infrastructure similar to that of the internet and to provide a one-stop-shop style blockchain-based service that integrates cloud resources, underlying frameworks, operating environments, key management, development SDK and gateway API. Just like building a simple website on the internet, developers can deploy and operate blockchain and distributed ledger applications conveniently and at an extremely low-cost.”

The BSN also aims to solve the problem of interoperability within a complex system, something that many other companies have tried to address in the past. This time around, many officials in the space were confident that the BSN would be able to handle the situations. One of the officials who were positive about the launch was Hoggang Chen, VP of PeerSafe, a blockchain startup based in Beijing. He claimed that the efforts of BSN would crack the interoperability code with plans to launch Peersafe products on the latest network.

Members of the BSN team stated that not all network protocols will be allowed in the latest blockchain framework. Zhiguan Shan said that foreign protocols such as HyperLedger will have to be tweaked in order to fit into the workings of the BSN. The BSN Network Operations Platform is currently managed by its founding members, including China UnionPay, Red Date Tech and China Mobile.

Small and medium-sized enterprises within the country are expected to benefit from the latest launch as it provides a faster and more interconnected trading ecosystem. BSN will host data from multiple cloud providers to ensure a free flow of information between all parties involved. A cursory analysis has shown that BSN is ready to host thousands of applications on its network, just like the Internet.

According to earlier releases, we know that the network is backed by large Chinese corporations and banks. Interconnectivity was the need for an hour with multiple nodes set to be placed outside the mainland of China. Seven location cities have been selected: Sydney, Paris, California, Singapore, Tokyo, San Paulo, California, and Johannesburg.