Abu Dhabi, United Arab of Emirates, 04 March 2023:
Speakers from around the world explored in a session titled “How Blockchain Will Change Finance“ how utilizing blockchain technology will achieve efficiencies and unlock value in the traditional financial industry, at the Investopia Conference 2023, held on 2-3 March in Abu Dhabi.
The discussion was led by Jeremy Allaire, Co-Founder, Chairman and CEO, Circle; Dmitry Tokarev, CEO, Copper; Dr. Alexander Lipton, Global Head, Quantitative Research and Development, ADIA; and Ronit Ghose, Global Head, Future of Finance, Citi.
Elaborating on the potential of blockchain to revolutionize finance, Jeremy Allaire, Co-Founder, Chairman and CEO, Circle highlighted that blockchain’s decentralized ledger could provide financial services with a ledger that nobody owns. The Stablecoin sector, including Circle, is a good example of blockchain’s potential. Circle launched its digital dollar, USDC, five years ago and now has 43 billion in circulation. While only 10 million digital wallets currently support Stablecoins, this number is expected to increase into billions. This financial infrastructure could make digital currency useful for everyday activities such as borrowing and lending.
Stating his perspective towards Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), Dr. Alexander Lipton believes that the time has come to create digital versions of fiat currency, and that blockchain technology provides an opportunity to fill gaps in identity and money created by the internet. He believes that borrowing concepts from the original creators of blockchain will help in building a CBDC. In addition, there is a strong appetite among governments for CBDCs, which could provide several layers of benefits, such as cutting the fees charged by credit cards, supporting micropayments, and enabling automated foreign exchange. However, the creation of currencies by bigger nations is a matter of sovereignty, and some countries should be aware of the opportunities presented by CBDCs.
Shedding light on how blockchain technology can make things better in the banking and lending sectors, Dmitry Tokarev highlighted that blockchain can be applied to capital markets and optimize existing processes. Blockchain is a thread and not a product, and he gave an example of how cloud computing democratized access to computational power. Dmitry believes that blockchain could have a similar effect in the future. He thinks that within the two primary pillars of liquidity and optimization of capital, blockchain will help create a world of decentralized finance (DeFi) in risk monitoring systems, data trading, and front-office operations, and exciting times are ahead.
Providing insight into Web3, Ronit Ghose highlighted that ChatGpt, an AI technology, has generated significant interest in the DLT/blockchain application for the finance industry. This is the first time in AI history that the end users are meshing with the technology, making it user-friendly for everyone from the C-Suite to 9-year-olds. Blockchain can match with the end user by providing smart and programmable barrier instruments, such as Stablecoins and CBDCs. Companies need to create easy and usable interfaces for these instruments to become the trojan horse to digitization.
In the discussion, the panellists highlighted the need to improve user experience and integrate the technology with existing regulations and policies, to build trust in the financial industry through blockchain technology. However, the deployment of the third generation of blockchain and infrastructure upgrades provide hope for widespread adoption of Stablecoins in the next 2-3 years. The challenge is to integrate technology with regulations and policies to reach the catalyst stage for mass market adoption. The panellists expressed optimism for the future of tokenization and hybrid physical and digital tokens, while emphasizing the need for a new system to replace the old legacy system in a regulated framework.
Investopia conference 2023 focused on the theme “Envisioning Opportunities in Times of Change” and three sub-themes: Envisioning Opportunities in Today’s Economy, The Future of the Wealth of Nations, and Growth Opportunities in Times of Decarbonization. The conference this year included 35 sessions and roundtables, and brought together more than 2000 participants like investors, government officials, thought leaders and entrepreneurs, from more than 40 countries.
For detailed information about the conference agenda, kindly visit this website:
