Wall Street Journal: Dun & Bradstreet conducts blockchain trade finance test

Rage Comment : Dun & Bradstreet is the world's most famous and oldest credit management company for corporate credit investigation. The company recently announced that it is paying attention to blockchain technology testing of global financial companies and will select appropriate technology applications to integrate into the company's corporate information database. In addition, the blockchain infrastructure will use the Ethereum blockchain platform.

Translation: Annie_Xu

Dun & Bradstreet Corp., a well-known U.S. credit management company, is testing distributed ledger technology to provide professional company data to corporate clients. The company's chief information officer pointed out that it plans to launch trade finance partner review and transaction services and use the Ethereum blockchain open source platform.

Saleem Khan, Vice President of Data Innovation at Dun & Bradstreet, said:

Blockchain technology can help companies quickly confirm trade finance transactions, which is more efficient than the current methods used by participants in the ecosystem, such as banks and suppliers. Currently, the exchange of paper documents such as bills of lading and invoices between buyers, sellers and carriers of goods is usually involved.

By moving the “financial supply chain” to the blockchain ledger, traders can use the immutable digital records on the Dun & Bradstreet blockchain to confirm their identities and contract terms.

Large banks such as JP Morgan Chase & Co. are testing blockchain technology for financial transactions, and "we want to make sure we have the same access for our messaging services."

Dun & Bradstreet provides financial data for private and public companies. The company's database stores 250 million corporate records and has 30,000 data sources.

Saleem Khan

Khan said:

Currently, the pilot project has opened up the data of 6,500 listed companies. The company's blockchain system matches the company's DUNS code (the company code in the Dun & Bradstreet database) with the unique blockchain identity code developed by the blockchain company. For example, he said that companies involved in trade financing business can verify the information of potential partners in real time, including address, company registration name, whether there is a record of illegal activities, etc. In the future, the company's system may include consulting services, including collecting and screening information of potential partners from the blockchain database. Dun & Bradstreet will charge a certain fee.

Khan did not give a specific release date for the system, only saying that it would take several months to test it. Currently, dozens of large financial companies such as Bank of America, UBS, and Nasdaq are testing blockchain technology in an attempt to conduct transactions in a faster and safer way.