Using Distributed Ledger Technology for Payment Directories

Abstract

Although distributed ledgers frequently are viewed as a revolutionary technology that could transform many markets, the technology has not yet received wide-scale business adoption. This may be due in part to a lack of use cases for which the decentralized and distributed features of distributed ledger technology (DLT) are optimal. But payment directories (known in certain markets as registries), which facilitate the lookup of payments-related information, may be a use case that has specific challenges that take better advantage of these features than other use cases explored by businesses to date. Directories that support routing of information to support payments like aliases for peer-to-peer payments and business-to-business e-invoices may benefit from the use of DLT. DLT allows market participants to maintain and to protect localized information without the competitive, operational, and technical challenges of a centralized database.