Fintech 360: Curious Cases Around the Globe

Around the world with Ternion.

Here is a quick rundown of new and exciting cases of tech fever that is taking the world by storm.

Forbes on Blockchain

Forbes Inc. has announced a partnership with Civil — a journalism blockchain network, which will turn Forbes into the first major publishing company to explore publishing articles on the blockchain. Currently, Forbes has started publishing a few articles on Civil Network, and it plans to transfer all of its content after a successful trial. Once the program rolls out, all Forbes journalists will simultaneously publish articles to the Civil Network and Forbes.com. Initially, the articles will be about crypto and later the content will be diversified to capture more areas of interest.

VISA and Blockchain

Visa has announced that it has partnered with IBM to prepare a digital identity system based on blockchain for use with B2B Connect, IBM’s international payment service. Visa wants to tokenize banking details for easy transactions on B2B Connect. The company states that it will use the Hyperledger Fabric framework, hosted by Linux and developed with IBM, with the objective of developing a scalable and permission-based network later on the road.

Japan and Self-regulation

Japan’s Financial Services Agency has declared that the cryptocurrency industry now has an authority to self-regulate. The decision will now allow the Japan Virtual Currency Exchange Association, a coalition of several registered digital currency exchanges, to define their own rules and operational requirements, including AML and KYC rules. The Association will oversee the implementation of such rules.

It is argued that self-regulation helps to regain trust in the market. However, it will be hard to trust an exchange that is not being accountable to a government entity, and thus does not need to comply with strict measures for anti-money-laundering that government agencies usually put forth.

Berlin — a new crypto hub?

Berlin is emerging as a crypto hub. The city’s low cost of living and number of co-working space have drawn people to start living and working in the area. Berlin has positioned itself as a “very open ecosystem”, with a number of crypto and blockchain companies and meetups constantly drawing more and more people there.

Indeed, Berlin-based EOS, a blockchain operating system for commercial-scale decentralized applications, ranked fifth in the world with a market capitalization of $4.9 billion. Another example, IOTA, a distributed ledger designed to record and execute transactions between machines in the Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem, is among the leading companies with a market capitalization of $1.3 billion.

Bundesblock, a trade association which represents blockchain startups in Germany, is collaborating with German government officials to advance the adoption of blockchain technology.

Attorney General vs Crypto exchanges

Office of the Attorney General in New York has published a report on crypto exchanges operating in New York. Earlier in 2018, the office of AG has requested information from major exchanges on their internal operation mechanisms.

The report outlines a few main concerns that need to be accounted for in order to sustain fair trading operations. The recurrent conclusions include the lack of internal safeguards and insurance mechanisms that protect customer assets, another area of concern was a lack of regulation of bots and automated algorithms.

You can read a full report here: https://virtualmarkets.ag.ny.gov/. The report also outlines essential questions that a potential customer needs to ask before investing. After conducting the report, the office of AG has referred Binance, Gate.io, and Kraken to the New York State Department of Financial Services for potentially operating unlawfully in New York.

Whether you consider blockchain and crypto a fluke or institutions of future, government and companies around the world are not immune to them and are starting to work towards their implementation.

Thank you for taking a trip around the globe with Ternion! Let us know in the comments below which fintech advancement is the most exciting one in your view.

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