Use of distributed ledger technology by central banks: A review

Authors

  • César A. Del Río Universidad de Otavalo

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.29019/enfoqueute.v8n5.175

Keywords:

dlt, blockchain, distributed ledger, fintech, digital currency

Abstract

This paper reviews what stage the central banks of the world’s leading economies are at in their study and adoption of distributed ledger technology (DLT) to reengineer their various systems and functions. A brief description of DLT will be given, followed by an analysis of central banks’ publications and pronouncements to determine what each central bank is doing on their journey to DLT adoption. It was found that of the central banks for which information was available, all of them have expressed interest in DLT and have evaluated it to some extent. Nevertheless, no central bank has an operational DLT-based system at this point. This is because some issues remain regarding the speed, cost of processing, security, transparency and privacy, legal settlement finality, scalability and network effects of the technology. As DLT matures, the expectation is that these issues will begin to be resolved.

Metrics

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Bank of Finland. (2016). Finland’s central bank explores the blockchain » Finextra. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://www.finextra.com/pressarticle/67297/finlands-central-bank-explores-the-blockchain?utm_medium=rss&utm_source=finextrafeed
BBVA. (2017, April 21). BBVA completes first real-time international money transfer between Europe and Mexico with Ripple. Retrieved October 17, 2017, from https://www.bbva.com/en/bbva-completes-first-real-time-international-money-transfer-europe-mexico-ripple/
Bech, M., & Garratt, R. (2017). Central bank cryptocurrencies. BIS Quarterly Review, September, 55–70.
Belinky, M., Rennick, E., & Veitch, A. (2015). The fintech 2.0 paper: Rebooting financial services. Retrieved from http://santanderinnoventures.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/The-Fintech-2-0-Paper.pdf
BIS. (2017). Distributed ledger technology in payment, clearing and settlement. Retrieved from https://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d157.pdf
Bitcoin.org. (2017). Bitcoin FAQ. Retrieved November 28, 2017, from https://bitcoin.org/en/faq#who-created-bitcoin
Blockchain Technologies. (2016). Blockchain technology explained. Retrieved October 18, 2017, from http://www.blockchaintechnologies.com/blockchain-definition
Bott, J., & Milkau, U. (2017). Central bank money and blockchain: A payments perspective. Journal of Payments Strategy & Systems, 11(2), 145–178.
Burgos, A. de V., Filho, J. D. de O., Suares, M. V. C., & de Almeida, R. S. (2017). Distributed ledger technical research in Central Bank of Brazil. Retrieved from http://www.bcb.gov.br/htms/public/microcredito/Distributed_ledger_technical_research_in_Central_Bank_of_Brazil.pdf
Carney, M. (2017a). Mark Carney: Building the infrastructure to realise FinTech’s promise. Retrieved from www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches
Carney, M. (2017b). Mark Carney: The promise of FinTech – Something new under the sun? Wiesbaden. Retrieved from http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/speeches/2017/speech956.pdf
Casey, M. J. (2017). It’s political: Why China hates bitcoin and loves the blockchain » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/political-china-hates-bitcoin-loves-blockchain/
Central bank of Iceland. (2017). Seminar on possible new forms of central bank money. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://www.cb.is/publications/events/event/2017/02/09/Seminar-on-possible-new-forms-of-central-bank-money/
Chapman, J., Garratt, R., Hendry, S., McCormack, A., & McMahon, W. (2017). Project Jasper: Are distributed wholesale payment systems feasible yet? Retrieved from http://www.bankofcanada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/fsr-june-2017-chapman.pdf
Cleland, V. (2017). Digital future for sterling: Assessing the implications. Retrieved from http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/research/Documents/onebank/vclelandglobalpublicinvestor2017.pdf
Creer, D., Crook, R., Hornsby, M., González Avalis, N., Simpson, M., Weisfeld, N., … Zieliński, I. (2016). Proving Ethereum for the clearing use case. Retrieved from https://emerald-platform.gitlab.io/static/emeraldTechnicalPaper.pdf
Czech National Bank. (2017). Position of the Czech National Bank to the selected questions of the Commission consultation. Retrieved from http://www.cnb.cz/miranda2/export/sites/www.cnb.cz/en/supervision_financial_market/legislation/cnb_opinions/download/2017_fintech_consultation_document_cnb_opinion.pdf
Daniell, J. (2017). Estonia explores national digital currency with token offering proposal » ETHNews. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://www.ethnews.com/estonia-explores-national-digital-currency-with-token-offering-proposal
Danmarks Nationalbank. (2017). Danes are front-runners in electronic payments. Analysis, (6), 8. Retrieved from http://www.nationalbanken.dk/en/publications/Documents/2017/03/Analysis_Danes are Front-runners in Electronic Payments.pdf#search=%22distributed ledger%22
Das, S. (2017). Bitcoin isn’t a currency due to its instability, claims Austrian Central Bank Governor » Crypto Coins News. Retrieved October 31, 2017, from https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/bitcoin-isnt-currency-due-instability-claims-austrian-central-bank-governor/
del Castillo, M. (2016a). Dutch Central Bank prepares its boldest blockchain experiment yet » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 2, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/dutch-central-bank-preparing-boldest-blockchain-experiment-yet/
del Castillo, M. (2016b). Swiss central banker Thomas Jordan: Blockchain turning finance “on its head” » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 4, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/sibos-swiss-central-bank-blockchain-regulation/
del Castillo, M. (2017). South Africa’s financial power players are going all-in on blockchain » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 4, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/south-africas-biggest-financial-power-players-just-went-blockchain/
Deutsche Bundesbank. (2017). Distributed ledger technologies in payments and securities settlement: Potential and risks. Monthly report. Retrieved from https://www.bundesbank.de/Redaktion/EN/Downloads/Publications/Monthly_Report_Articles/2017/2017_09_distributed.pdf?__blob=publicationFile
ECB, & BOJ. (2017). BOJ/ECB joint research project on distributed ledger technology. Retrieved from https://www.ecb.europa.eu/paym/intro/news/shared/20170906_stella_report_leaflet.pdf
EconoTimes. (2017). Bank of Korea, R3 consortium to carry out blockchain project » EconoTimes. Retrieved November 2, 2017, from http://www.econotimes.com/Exclusive-Bank-of-Korea-R3-consortium-to-carry-out-blockchain-project-549053
Federal Reserve System. (2017). Federal Reserve next steps in the payments improvement journey. Retrieved from https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/files/other20170906a1.pdf
Fiennes, T. (2017). Toby Fiennes: The Reserve Bank, cyber security and the regulatory framework. Auckland. Retrieved from https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/-/media/ReserveBank/Files/Publications/Speeches/2017/The-Reserve-Bank-cyber-security-regulatory-framework.pdf
François Villeroy de Galhau. (2017). François Villeroy de Galhau: France - a European powerhouse for financial service innovation. Paris. Retrieved from https://www.bis.org/review/r170203e.pdf
Furche, P., Madeira, C., Marcel, M., & Medel, C. A. (2017). FinTech and the future of central banking. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Carlos_Madeira/publication/319206045_FinTech_and_the_Future_of_Central_Banking/links/599b227ea6fdcc500349b82f/FinTech-and-the-Future-of-Central-Banking.pdf
González-Páramo, J. M. (2017). Financial innovation in the digital age: Challenges for regulation and supervision. Revista de Estabilidad Financiera, 32, 30.
Hearn, M. (2016). Corda: A distributed ledger. R3. Retrieved from https://docs.corda.net/_static/corda-technical-whitepaper.pdf
Hiesboeck, M. (2016). Blockchain is the most disruptive invention since the Internet itself - not just in finance » Digital Doughnut. Retrieved October 16, 2017, from https://www.digitaldoughnut.com/articles/2016/april/blockchain-is-the-most-disruptive-invention-since
Higgins, S. (2017). South Africa’s Central Bank: It’s “too risky” to launch a cryptocurrency » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 4, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/south-africas-central-bank-risky-launch-cryptocurrency/
Hileman, G., & Rauchs, M. (2017). Global blockchain benchmarking study. Retrieved from https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/fileadmin/user_upload/research/centres/alternative-finance/downloads/2017-09-27-ccaf-globalbchain.pdf
IDRBT. (2017). Applications of blockchain technology to banking and financial sector in India. Hyderabad. Retrieved from http://www.idrbt.ac.in/assets/publications/Best Practices/BCT.pdf
Khrennikov, I., & Rudnitsky, J. (2017). Russia’s banks prepare to hit the “gas” on digital currencies » Bloomberg. Retrieved November 3, 2017, from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-01/russia-s-banks-prepare-to-hit-the-gas-on-digital-currency-use
Kitchenham, B., & Charters, S. (2007). Guidelines for performing systematic literature reviews in software engineering EBSE Technical Report EBSE-2007-01. Keele, Staffs, and Durham, UK.
Koranyi, B., & Evans, C. (2017). Blockchain immature for big central banks, ECB and BOJ say » Reuters. Retrieved October 17, 2017, from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blockchain-ecb/blockchain-immature-for-big-central-banks-ecb-and-boj-say-idUSKCN1BH2DH
Lane, P. R. (2017). Philip R Lane: Drivers of change in the banking sector. Dublin. Retrieved from https://www.bis.org/review/r170727a.pdf
Levring, P. (2016). Blockchain lures central banks as Danes consider minting e-krone » Bloomberg. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-11/blockchain-lures-central-banks-as-danes-consider-minting-e-krone
Marty, B. (2016). Argentina’s Central Bank is warming up to blockchain » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 1, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/argentinas-central-bank-warming-blockchain/
MAS. (2017). Project Ubin: SGD on distributed ledger. Retrieved from http://www.mas.gov.sg/~/media/ProjectUbin/Project Ubin SGD on Distributed Ledger.pdf
Meola, A. (2017). How banks and financial institutions are implementing blockchain technology » Business Insider UK. Retrieved October 17, 2017, from http://uk.businessinsider.com/blockchain-technology-banking-finance-2017-9
Mesropyan, E. (2016). 21 areas of blockchain application beyond financial services » Let’s Talk Payments. Retrieved October 16, 2017, from https://letstalkpayments.com/21-areas-of-blockchain-application-beyond-financial-services/
Mills, D., Wang, K., Malone, B., Ravi, A., Marquardt, J., Chen, C., … Kar-Genian, V. (2016). Distributed ledger technology in payments, clearing, and settlement. Butterworths Journal of International Banking and Financial Law, 31 (11), 36. https://doi.org/10.17016/FEDS.2016.095
Nakamoto, S. (2009). Bitcoin: A peer-to-peer electronic cash system. bitcoin.org. Retrieved from https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
National Bank of Belgium. (2017). National Bank of Belgium Report 2016 - Prudential regulation and supervision. Retrieved from https://www.nbb.be/doc/ts/publications/nbbreport/2016/en/t1/report2016_tiii.pdf
Nicolaisen, J. (2017). Jon Nicolaisen: What should the future form of our money be? Origins of the central bank. Oslo. Retrieved from https://www.bis.org/review/r170426d.pdf
Powell, J. H. (2017). Jerome H. Powell: Innovation, technology, and the payments system. New Haven. Retrieved from https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/files/powell20170303b.pdf
PwC. (2017). Global FinTech Report 2017. Retrieved from https://www.pwc.com/jg/en/publications/pwc-global-fintech-report-17.3.17-final.pdf
Reserve Bank of Australia. (2017). Developments in the financial system architecture. Financial Stability Review, (April), 45–50.
Sveriges Riksbank. (2017). The Riksbank’s e-krona project. Retrieved from http://www.riksbank.se/Documents/Rapporter/E-krona/2017/rapport_ekrona_170920_eng.pdf
TMX. (2017). Payments Canada, Bank of Canada and TMX Group announce integrated securities and payment platform as next phase of Project Jasper. Retrieved October 31, 2017, from https://www.tmx.com/newsroom/press-releases?id=615&year=2017
Wilkins, C., & Gaetz, G. (2017). Could DLT underpin an entire wholesale payment system? » The Globe and Mail. Retrieved October 31, 2017, from https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-commentary/could-dlt-underpin-an-entire-wholesale-payment-system/article35106771/?ref=http://www.theglobeandmail.com&
Zhao, W. (2017). Polish regulators warn banks and consumers on cryptocurrency risks » CoinDesk. Retrieved November 3, 2017, from https://www.coindesk.com/polish-regulators-warn-banks-consumers-cryptocurrency-risks/

Published

2017-12-18

How to Cite

Del Río, C. A. (2017). Use of distributed ledger technology by central banks: A review. Enfoque UTE, 8(5), pp. 1 - 13. https://doi.org/10.29019/enfoqueute.v8n5.175

Issue

Section

Miscellaneous