Accenture: Blockchain technology could save eight major investment banks $12 billion by 2025

Sina Technology News: On the evening of January 17th, Beijing time, management consulting service company Accenture released a report today saying that by 2025, blockchain technology can help the world's eight largest investment banks save US$8 billion to US$12 billion in infrastructure costs each year.

The forecast is based on Accenture's analysis of cost data from eight of the world's largest investment banks. Blockchain is the underlying technology of the digital currency Bitcoin. For Bitcoin, blockchain technology can track currency transactions. But in fact, the technology can also track transactions of anything of value, including stocks, bonds or other financial securities.

In fact, blockchain is a distributed transaction record or other data maintained by a computer network on the Internet without the approval of a central agency. Because it creates a shared data "golden record" that is tamper-proof, thus avoiding the need for "reconciliation", it has great potential in the field of auditing.

Currently, many banks and large financial institutions are developing blockchain-based technologies to support the heavy work of clearing departments, such as securities clearing and settlement. However, many people are skeptical about the impact of blockchain technology, saying that investment banks are jumping on the "blockchain bandwagon" just for show.

In this regard, Accenture executive David Treat said: "It is not surprising that investment banks have invested heavily in blockchain technology, as they previously had extremely high costs for data correction."

Accenture estimates that by deploying blockchain technology, the eight investment banks will reduce infrastructure costs by 30%, mainly due to higher data quality and transparency. In addition, costs in meeting regulatory requirements and business operations (such as transaction support) can be reduced by up to 50%.

However, the report also pointed out that if regulators restrict the widespread adoption of blockchain technology, these investment banks will not benefit from it. (Li Ming)