Barclays Rep Says Blockchain “Should be Built with the Law in Mind”

Reconfigure Approach

The representative stated his opinion while speaking at a Hard Fork Decentralized event. Wilson said developers need to think about laws and legislations while building blockchain based systems and “reconfigure our approach and way of thinking.”

Julian’s vision is an environment where the technology is adapted to compliment the current regulation system, rather than challenging it. He argued that the technology has a lot of implementations, but not every kind of business actually needs it to improve upon the existing business model. He stated Barclays itself as an example, saying that the 300 plus year old financial institution would have difficulties switching over to blockchain and that the solution would need to be “bespoke.”

Flirting with Blockchain

Barclays has been touching blockchain on and off again, testing it to see if a paradigm shift to the technology would be beneficial or too much of a trouble. It held a hackathonin August this year, with emphasis on seeking the decentralized technology’s ability to process and record derivative contracts.

The bank has denied it is interested in opening up a cryptocurrency related trading desk recently. On the other hand, it filed for two patents in the U.S. involving the technology. One is related to transfer of digital assets and currencies, while the other one is storing data on blockchainitself.

Barclays has joined a growing list of banks which are actively seeking out practical uses of blockchain technology beyond the cryptocurrency sphere. BBVA, a major Spanish bank recently completed transfer of loanmoney on a custom forked blockchain, while the Russian Sberbank has run a foreign exchange repurchase agreementthrough smart contract technology.