When one of the largest banks in the world announces that 75 other banks have signed up to join a new payments information network it has developed, which, powered by Quorum, is a permissioned variant of the Ethereum blockchain, that grabs a lot of attention.
This is the largest number of banks to join any blockchain application in live production. And when Euromoney sits down with the lead bank, just a couple of weeks after this announcement, it soon becomes clear that take up has proceeded even faster than first expected. The Interbank Information Networks (IIN) is already approaching 100 banks signed up as of the second week of October.
Partly that’s testament to the sheer power of network pioneer JPMorgan, the largest US dollar clearer globally whose treasury services business processes approximately 26 million payments transactions a day, in total worth over $3 trillion in 108 currencies and 100 countries.
Extraordinary
When you recall chief executive Jamie Dimon’s previous fulmination against bitcoin, this rapid take up of the first live blockchain service provided by the bank he leads looks even more extraordinary.
