Singapore's Central Bank Eyes Commercial Role for Its Blockchain Payments Tech
Project Ubin has completed its last development phase and is now being considered as the basis for commercial digital currency ventures.
Jul 13, 2020 at 11:13 a.m. UTCUpdated Aug 19, 2021 at 3:03 a.m. UTC
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A blockchain project from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and state investor Temasek has completed its final development phase and is now being considered as the basis for commercial payments ventures.
- Singapore's central banking authority and Temasek said Monday that with the fifth research cycle for project Ubin now complete, "the next leap will be in implementing live commercial solutions to solve realworld challenges."
- Ubin has been running as a multi-currency payments platform and has leveraged work on a blockchain and digital currency at U.S. investment bank J.P. Morgan.
- Beginning in 2016 as a clearing and settlements initiative, Ubin's fifth phase (launched in November 2019), branched out to other areas including capital markets, supply chain finance and insurance.
- The research found Ubin made complex financial transactions more efficient by lowering fees on foreign currency trading and cross border payments, as well as using smart contracts as a secure alternative to traditional escrow accounts.
- The report says banks are now exploring whether Ubin can become the template for a commercial multi-currency platform for users to transact directly with one another.
- If successful, it could even go on to form the basis for a global payments platform for central banks, the report added.
- This was the last experimental phase to see MAS involvement, with Temasek saying it will support efforts to use Ubin for commercial ventures.
- Ubin will continue running for the rest of 2020 as a test network for central banks and financial institutions to trial cross-border payments infrastructure.
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UPDATE (July 15, 13:35 UTC): This piece has been updated with information.
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