The emergence of distributed systems has revolutionized the financial technology (Fintech) landscape, offering unprecedented opportunities for enhancing security, scalability, and efficiency in financial operations. This paper explores the role of distributed systems in Fintech, analyzing their architecture, benefits, challenges, and applications. It examines key distributed technologies such as blockchain, decentralized finance (DeFi), and distributed ledger technology (DLT), and their impact on various aspects of the financial industry, and future directions for distributed systems in Fintech.
This study investigates the factors influencing the adoption of financial technology (FinTech) and decentralized finance (DeFi) among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Morocco. The research aims to shed light on the current landscape of digital financial services and explore the potential for DeFi implementation in the Moroccan context. Using a quantitative research method, data was gathered through self-administered questionnaires distributed to SMEs in Morocco. The Diffusion of Innovation Theory serves as the theoretical framework to understand the factors driving FinTech and DeFi adoption. The results reveal a strong and positive correlation between “Relative Advantage” and “Adoption” (0.323), indicating that SMEs perceive FinTech and DeFi as beneficial and advantageous for their businesses. Additionally, a positive correlation is found between “Trial Ability” and “Adoption” (0.277), suggesting that SMEs’ ability to experiment with these technologies influences their adoption behavior. Furthermore, a weaker positive correlation is observed between “Compatibility” and “Adoption” (0.152), implying that the alignment of FinTech and DeFi with existing practices and systems plays a role in their adoption. Regarding DeFi implementation, the study finds that 64% of Moroccan SMEs maintain a neutral stance, while 5% express serious concerns about its future in the Moroccan financial landscape. This finding highlights the need for further education and awareness-raising efforts to foster a more positive perception of DeFi among SMEs. This research contributes to the existing body of knowledge by providing empirical evidence of the factors influencing FinTech and DeFi adoption among SMEs in Morocco. The findings offer valuable insights for policymakers, financial institutions, and technology providers in designing strategies to promote the adoption of these technologies and enhance financial inclusion in Morocco.
This article explores the evolution of crypto-anarchy, tracing its origins from the cypherpunk movement to the rise of decentralized finance (DeFi) and its transformative effects on legal and economic systems. Central to crypto-anarchy is the belief in individual empowerment through privacy, financial autonomy, and decentralization, which allows users to bypass traditional intermediaries like banks. While these technologies offer increased freedom and financial inclusion, they also introduce significant risks such as money laundering, tax evasion, and the facilitation of illegal activities, posing challenges to current regulatory frameworks. The article examines the socio-economic implications of decentralization, including both the democratization of finance and the widening wealth disparities, as early adopters often gain disproportionate rewards. Environmental concerns related to energy-intensive cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and ethical dilemmas surrounding privacy versus accountability are also addressed. The article concludes by examining the potential for AI, blockchain, and decentralized governance models to further disrupt traditional financial and governance structures, while emphasizing the need for robust regulatory frameworks to mitigate risks and ensure long-term sustainability. It envisions a future where decentralized technologies contribute to a more transparent, equitable, and participatory global economy.
The emergence of blockchain and smart contracts has revolutionized various industries by enabling automated code execution. However, the development of smart contracts, rooted in programming languages, inherits common challenges in traditional software development, notably concerning efficiency, reliability, and security. The application of deep learning techniques holds promise for addressing these challenges. However, a critical issue in applying deep learning to smart contracts is the lack of extensive datasets, as smart contracts have only recently emerged compared to traditional programming languages. To address this problem, we propose a novel approach called Compiler-Guided Generation Networks (CGGNet) for augmenting smart contract datasets. In contrast to existing methods, CGGNet utilizes a compiler as an oracle in generative networks, ensuring the augmentation of a valid smart contract. By incorporating the Montecarlo tree search, CGGNet significantly enhances the diversity and validity of the generated contracts, overcoming the limitations posed by GAN-based models in code augmentations. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study on code augmentation targeting smart contracts. Our experiments show that millions of unique and valid smart contracts can be augmented from thousands of valid smart contracts, and augmented datasets can mitigate the underfitting problem in practical deep learning applications.
A concept of the smart contract powered by Ethereum has raised the attention of investors in the crypto-currency market in the light of the distributed account book techniques in the Era of Blockchain 2.0. Based on the digitalization of the financial tools, smart contract adopts the smart validation and execution of the computation protocols extending the blockchain to the application level of use to reinforce the security and transparency of transaction deals. This paper aimed to investigate the principle, functions, ground mechanism of the smart contract, and protection approaches and evaluated the security issues existed in the investment process. Lastly, the paper summarized the Smart Contract design and development, loopholes, and protection approaches in the Smart Contract applications.
Teknolojinin gelişmesi ile iletişim araçlarında başlayan değişim birçok farklı sektöre ve alana yayılmıştır. Bu değişimi yaşayan alanlardan biri de geleneksel oyun kavramı olmuştur. Oyunun oynandığı ortam, konsol, yazılım değişmiş ve dijital oyun kavramı ortaya çıkmıştır. Dijital oyunların sağladığı etkileşimli dünya, sosyalleşme kavramını dahi değiştirmiş ve kavramın anlamı tartışılır noktaya gelmiştir. Ancak teknolojinin ilerlemesi günden güne devam etmektedir. Blokzincir teknolojisinin hayatımıza girmesi, bankacılığı, turizmi, sosyal mecraları etkilediği gibi dijital oyunları da etkilemiştir. Satoshi Nakatomo lakaplı bir yazarın 2008 yılında bir makalesinde bahsetmesiyle, dijital para birimi “Bitcoin” dünyada adını duyurmuştur. Başlangıçta para transferinde aracıyı ortadan kaldıran bir dijital bir para olarak faydalanabileceği düşünülen bu kripto paranın inşasını sağlayan Blokzincir teknolojisi ise birçok alanda değişim yaratmaya başlamıştır. Nakatomo, Blokzincir’i; sürekli büyüyen işlem kayıtlarının listesini çalınma veya değiştirilme gibi tehlikelerden koruyarak tutan dağıtık veri tabanı olarak tanımlamaktadır. Blokzincir teknolojisinin popülerleşmeye başlaması ile birlikte ise NFT(Non-fungible token) kavramı literatürde yer almaya başlamıştır. Bir dijital varlığın benzersiz bir kriptografik anahtarına sahip olan, çoğaltılamayan, sahibi tek olan NFT’ler temellerinde yatan blokzincir teknolojisiyle sanat başta olmak üzere birçok alanda etkisini göstermiştir. Bu alanlardan biri dijital oyunlar olmuş ve NFT oyunlarıyla birlikte play-to-earn oyunları ortaya çıkmıştır. Ethereum akıllı kontratlarıyla üretilen NFT, ne kadar dijital sanat eserleri ile ünlense de günümüzde birçok NFT ve blokzincir tabanlı oyun vardır. Bu oyunları oynayan kullanıcılar token üretebilmekte (mining), oyunların NFT avatarlarına sahip olabilmekte ve en önemlisi bu yolla maddi kazanç sağlayabilmektedirler. Bu bağlamda bir kazanç mekanizmasıyla oynanan oyunlara “Play to Earn” oyunları denir. Oyunlar geliştikçe klanlar oluşmakta ve dijital oyunda bahsettiğimiz etkileşim, sosyalleşme kavramları Discord, Telegram gibi uygulamaların sohbet gruplarında devam etmektedir. Çalışmamızda NFT ve play-to-earn oyunları incelenecek ayrıca bu oyunların dijital oyunlar arasında nasıl bir yere sahip olduğu araştırılacaktır. Oyuncuların, oyunlara olan ilgisinin sebeplerini öğrenmek için Discord, Telegram gibi uygulamaların oyun gruplarında, oyuncuların yorumları toplanacak ve incelenecektir. Elde edilen bu veriler, içerik analizi yöntemiyle incelenerektir. Blokzincir, NFT, Play to Earn gibi teknolojilerin popülerleşmesi ve maddi kazanç sağlanmasıyla bu alandaki oyunlara da gösterilen ilgi artmıştır. Bu bağlamda NFT oyunlarının gelecekte nasıl bir yere sahip olacağı, kalıcı olup olmayacağı gibi sorular merak edilmektedir. NFT tabanlı oyunların detaylarının incelendiği çalışmada, oyunların geleceği de tartışmaya sunulacaktır.
Abstract This article examines the legal challenges of regulating Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) within financial markets, particularly those offering decentralized financial (DeFi) services. After classifying DAO in Social DAO, Investment DAO and Protocol DAO, it discusses the ambiguous legal status of DAOs, their decentralized and autonomous governance structure, and the obstacles these pose to traditional regulatory frameworks. DAOs are typically governed by smart contracts and operate on blockchain, complicating regulatory enforcement due to their decentralized, non-hierarchical structure. Additionally, the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in DAOs introduces further complexities regarding accountability and liability, as AI lacks legal personhood. The paper reports innovative regulatory approaches, including “embedded supervision”, which integrates monitoring mechanisms within DAO operations, and “polycentric co-regulation”, which involves collaborative regulatory input from industry stakeholders. Ultimately, it suggests that Protocol DAOs might be more suitably considered as “infrastructural assets” rather than traditional business entities, encouraging voluntary compliance and adapting standards to their unique, decentralized nature.
Jan 1, 2024·Proceedings of the ... Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences/Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences
This study investigates ownership of blockchain-based digital assets in a decentralized metaverse platform enabled by Web3 and built on blockchain technology. Using the dual-process model of psychological ownership, the research examines factors influencing individuals' desire for ownership in this context. Through fsQCA analysis, necessary conditions and configurations driving ownership patterns are identified. Findings reveal a substitutive relationship between Transfer rights and Voting rights, as well as between Control usage and Voting rights. Additionally, a complementary relationship is observed between the presence of Self-investment and absence of Trade as core conditions within configurations. Notably, in the absence of Profits and Trade, possessing Transfer rights or Voting rights plays a crucial role in driving individuals to acquire higher levels of blockchain-based digital asset ownership. High profits are also highlighted as a motivator for digital asset ownership. These findings shed light on the psychological dynamics of ownership in decentralized metaverse platforms and DAOs.
Large Language Models (LLMs) empowered agents are effective across various tasks and demonstrate outstanding performance, which can be further enhanced through collaboration with multiple LLM agents. The current approaches for collaboration with multiple LLM agents are static approaches, which adopt a fixed set of agents to interact with each other. However, these approaches suffer from a significant limitation: multi-agent collaboration depends on the assumption that all participants know each other in a local closed environment, can find each other and direct communication, and will act with integrity. To address these challenges, this paper proposes DeCoAgent, a novel framework for decentralized autonomous collaboration between LLMs empowered agents based on smart contracts. This framework enables decentralized autonomous collaboration between LLM agents, allowing them to register themselves, discover the capabilities of other agents, and assign tasks on the platform. LLMs can convert natural language descriptions from human and LLM agent users into smart contract calls, enabling agents to interact with humans, the blockchain, and other agents to achieve automation. This paper implements the platform based on OpenAI and Ethereum, demonstrating the practical feasibility of this approach. The proposed framework has broader applications, including supply chain management, manufacturing, crowdsourcing, and complementing other existing multi-agent collaborations. This framework is open source on GitHub. Please visit the repository athttps://github.com/AnanKing/DeCoAgent.
Solidity is very useful language programming in modeling investment and Finance exercises blockchain technology. The book covers BA and BS, MA and MS in Risk Management, Business Administration, Financial Services, International Business and Financial Derivatives and BS in Computational Finance. Most importantly, the book includes a range of materials to help the student, the practitioners and the investors to reinforce their learning skills in cryptocurrency programming. The market will be very responsive for our book especially that a lot of international students experience problem with their English and their numerical skills. It will cover the basic needs of postgraduate students and those who are interesting in investment and tokens creation. Readers would be able to understand token contracts. Buyers would be allowed to buy tokens using Ethers. Cryptocurrency companies could raise funds by making use of initial token offering, (ITO), by selling their tokens to other investors. The market in the next five years will become very complicated and would require the use of sophisticated risk management techniques and technological solutions in order to hedge market, operational, and credit risk. Good luck in your future career as crypto developer and investment programmer in the major investment banks such as JP Morgan, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, and Bank of America. I would like to thank the Schweser Kaplan organization for the professional education that covers the syllabus of the Chartered Financial Institute, (CFA). Parts of the CFA examples are used to calibrate the financial models. Please e-mail me if you have any questions or if you would like to suggest investment exercises. My e-mail is guirguismichel@gmail.com
Farizah Mohamed Isa, Mardiah Hayati Abu Bakar, Sarah Munirah Abdullah, Mohd Shaufiq Abdul Latif
A Non-Fungible Token or an NFT is described as a digital certificate representing ownership of, or rights to a unique digital asset, where the ownership is recorded on a non-centralized blockchain (a digital ledger of transactions that is not owned by the state or authoritative bodies).Common examples of NFTs are usually digital art or artistic works, including photos, videos, audio files, and collectibles, and may extend to game items, tickets, and other digital assets.
Decentralized finance (DeFi) offers a range of financial instruments and services that leverage the capabilities of web3 technology. Maker protocol, which enables users to obtain loans backed by cryptocurrencies, is one of them. Unlike traditional banks, Maker’s data is transparently recorded on the Ethereum blockchain. In this research paper, we focus on analyzing the lending aspect of Maker from a traditional finance perspective. To achieve this, we create a unique dataset with loan portfolios from the MakerDAO project, making it the first dataset of its kind in the DeFi field. This publicly available dataset contains essential financial characteristics related to borrowing, including balance, loss given default, annual equivalent rate, and probability of default. Additionally, we develop a specialized mathematical model tailored specifically to this project. This model allows us to estimate the probability of default by considering the presence of crypto-collateral and utilizing Brownian motion passage levels. The results of this study provide valuable insights into lending practices in DeFi projects. They also help bridge the gap between traditional finance and blockchain-based financial services.
Sayyed Usman Ahmed, Abutalha Danish, Nesar Ahmad, Tameem Ahmad
The rise in legislation and the need for task automation systems has resulted in an amplified requirement for software development. This is aimed at improving the accuracy and efficiency of reading and interpreting laws in legal activities, allowing for enhanced precision and swiftness. Currently, there is a need for analysts to interpret written legislation and then encode it into computer programs, which often leads to errors. As cryptocurrencies gain popularity, there is growing interest in utilizing Blockchain technology in the legal field. Specifically, smart contracts can be used to integrate business rules into laws and automate blockchain management. However, the process of writing fast and high-quality code can be improved by leveraging artificial intelligence based techniques such as natural language processing (NLP) to help practitioners. Despite reviewing the current state-of-the-art, there is a lack of existing work that combines smart contracts and NLP in the context of legislation analysis. This study work generates intelligent code from legislation analysis, utilizing NLP and Blockchain for this purpose. In this research work a pilot prototype for smart contract generation is developed and initial code samples are presented. This work demonstrates a promising results with 96% accuracy in Name Entity Recognition (NER) and also highlights the importance of smart contract generation through NLP.
Smart contracts offer automation for various decentralized applications but suffer from vulnerabilities that cause financial losses. Detecting vulnerabilities is critical to safeguarding decentralized applications before deployment. Automatic detection is more efficient than manual auditing of large codebases. Machine learning (ML) has emerged as a suitable technique for vulnerability detection. However, a systematic literature review (SLR) of ML models is lacking, making it difficult to identify research gaps. No published systematic review exists for ML approaches to smart contract vulnerability detection. This research focuses on ML-driven detection mechanisms from various databases. 46 studies were selected and reviewed based on keywords. The contributions address three research questions: vulnerability identification, machine learning model approaches, and data sources. In addition to highlighting gaps that require further investigation, the drawbacks of machine learning are discussed. This study lays the groundwork for improving ML solutions by mapping technical challenges and future directions.
Cryptocurrencies, recognized by their extreme volatility due to dependency on multiple direct and indirect factors, offer a significant challenge regarding precise price forecasting. This uncertainty has led to investment hesitation within the digital currency market. Previous research attempts have presented methodologies for price forecasting and trend prediction in cryptocurrencies. However, these forecasts have typically suffered from increased error rates, leaving the opportunity for improvement in this field. Furthermore, the influence of sentiment-based factors could compromise the reliability of price predictions. In this research, we have proposed a machine learning-driven framework that provides precise cryptocurrency price projections and adds an alert mechanism to guide investors. Our fundamental analyzer, Bi-LSTM and GRU hybrid model use historical data of digital currencies to train and reliably anticipate future values. Complementing this, a sentiment analyzer, utilizing a BERT and VADER hybrid model, analyzes sentiments to assess the forecast price as trustworthy or uncertain. Besides assisting investor decision-making, this technique also helps risk management in the dynamic realm of cryptocurrency. Our suggested approach delivers highly precise price predictions with dramatically decreased error rates compared to prior competitive studies. The proposed Bi-LSTM-GRU-BERT-VADER (BLGBV) model is tested for three cryptocurrencies, namely BTC, ETH, and Dogecoin and reports an average root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.0241%, 0.0645%, and 0.0978%, respectively.
Muhamad Agil Fachrian, Parman Sukarno, Aulia Arif Wardana
Abstract This research proposes a system to store transaction records from a payment gateway based on digital payments by utilizing blockchain technology and Interplanetary File System (IPFS) as distributed storage. In digital payments, the possibility of online fraud or theft of customer data is a problem that needs to be solved. Although the solution is to use a Payment Gateway with security standards to prevent these problems, the system is still centralized and vulnerable to the possibility of system failure or data changes by irresponsible people. Blockchain furnishes a secure and unalterable record for documenting payment transactions. Conversely, IPFS presents a decentralized and immune-to-censorship approach for storing and accessing data. The usage of these technologies guarantees the secure storage of payment transaction data and related documents (such as invoices and receipts) while effectively thwarting data manipulation or censorship attempts. Therefore, this research aims to build a blockchain technology system to increase security and maintain the integrity of the data generated from the Payment Gateway. This research using distributed data storage using IPFS to save transaction from the payment gateway data. Based on the evaluation and security analysis results, implementing a blockchain technology system to store transaction records from digital-based payment gateways can improve data security and integrity. In the gas fee increase analysis, the gas fee will increase according to the total number of bytes generated when the transaction is made, where each byte will cost 12 gwei to pay the gas fee.
Mobile smart contracts (MSCs) are essential to facilitate quick, safe, and decentralized transactions on mobile blockchain networks. Scalable blockchain solutions facilitate the establishment of a mobile blockchain ecosystem characterized by enhanced resilience and adaptability. This encourages an increase in the number of users and, thus, spreads the adoption of blockchain technology in the mobile domain. With the inception of blockchain technology, a wide range of applications use smart contracts due to their high customizability. However, problems with scalability and resource-intensive consensus procedures prevent their general use. Therefore, by conducting a systematic survey using Kitchenham’s guidelines of available scalable blockchains and consensus methods, this work seeks to identify and analyze these constraints. Out of a preliminary pool of 2,073 publications, our study, which consists of 25 selected studies, identifies 12 consensus mechanisms and 13 scalable blockchain systems. Our investigation shows that, despite the wide range of techniques, no existing blockchain solution provides the scalability and lightweight operating requirements to implement smart contracts on mobile devices. This realization draws attention to a significant gap in academic and industry-driven blockchain research that may have implications for the creation of MSCs. Our findings encourage academics to explore scalable and energy-efficient blockchain technology, targeting the creation of more approachable smart contracts designed with mobile devices in mind.
Jan 1, 2024·Proceedings of the ... Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences/Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences
Tobias Kölbel, Kai Alexander Binder, Christof Weinhardt
Decentralization in Web3 projects is a polarizing topic, with proponents and critics presenting divergent views on blockchain governance. To navigate these tensions, this study employs an exploratory design science research approach. It utilizes a multiple-case study methodology to develop a framework for tokenized decision making and analyze venture capital investments in Web3 projects. We enable researchers and practitioners to grasp the phenomenon in a structured manner and address a critical sub-field of information systems research, which focuses on power concentration in Web3 ecosystems.