Samsung and IBM partner to leverage Bitcoin blockchain technology

After Samsung is working with IBM to develop new applications using Bitcoin blockchain technology, blockchain technology has become increasingly favored by mainstream financial institutions and capital is flocking to it.

The Bitcoin blockchain is a publicly shared record of transactions that the entire Bitcoin network relies on. All confirmed transactions are included in the blockchain without exception. In this way, it can be confirmed that the Bitcoins to be spent in a new transaction are indeed owned by the spender. The integrity and timeliness of the blockchain are guaranteed by cryptographic algorithms.

Due to the existence of blockchain, Bitcoin transaction records can be clearly represented.

The financial industry did not realize that blockchain technology was a potential distributed ledger system until the early summer of 2015. The New York Stock Exchange announced an investment in Bitcoin trading platform Coinbase, Goldman Sachs Group invested in Bitcoin consumer service company Circle, and a subsidiary of large trading company DRW Holdings LLC was trying cryptocurrency trading. On June 24, Nasdaq announced a partnership with Bitcoin technology company Chain, which is an industry leader in providing blockchain infrastructure for financial institutions and enterprises, and became the first company on Nasdaq to participate in testing blockchain technology.

The application of blockchain technology has attracted widespread attention, partly because of the various controversies surrounding Bitcoin itself, from which blockchain technology originated. But as time goes by, more concerns are no longer entangled in whether this technology related to Bitcoin can completely abandon digital currency. In the first six months of this year, Bitcoin-related technology has surpassed the currency itself and become the center of attention for more institutions and companies.

Gerald Dwyer, a professor at Clemson University in the United States, told Caixin that blockchain technology plays a vital role in settlement and record keeping. In terms of tracking assets and liabilities, blockchain technology is similar to the function of Excel spreadsheets. The main difference between its use in Bitcoin and electronic currency is that no one person or company actually controls the blockchain. Of course, additional additions must be established through a competitive process.

For securities, blockchain technology provides the possibility of recording transactions and ownership. The design of blockchain technology itself can verify that both parties have assets to sell and funds to buy assets, so the existence of real brokers is unnecessary. Blockchain technology may be introduced into stock exchanges as a new technological revolution.

Blythe Masters, CEO of Digital Asset Holdings, was more blunt, saying blockchain technology is the financial challenge of our time and will change the way existing financial markets operate around the world.