Purpose The purpose of this paper is to help in providing a better understanding of the application of blockchain technology in the context of the banking and finance sectors. The aim is to outline blockchain's benefits, opportunities, costs, risks as well as challenges of the technology in the context of banking and finance services. Design/methodology/approach Careful examination of the extant literature, including utilising relevant academic-based research databases has been carried out. It covered reviewing various research contributions published in peer-reviewed journals, academic reports, as well as technical reports to help in identifying related benefits, opportunities, costs and risks. Findings The findings reveal that there are limited contributions in utilising blockchain in the banking and finance sectors when compared with other sectors. As such, the study highlighted the relevant perspective of benefits, opportunities, costs and risks within such sectors. Practical implications This study helps in offering a focal point to banking and financial sector managers and decision-makers for realising the value and offerings of blockchain technology as well as associated strategies and programmes. Originality/value This study highlights the need for a holistic understanding of the various aspects of cost, benefits, risk and opportunities to create blockchain applications that work for banking and finance sectors
Blockchain and artificial intelligence are the most important keywords in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. This study sought to apply these core technologies to future validated algorithms that make real estate transactions secure to come up with an encryption algorithm. In addition, the real estate transaction is being paid a large fee by the middlemen, the real estate agent. Furthermore and recently, P2P (peer-to-peer) real estate exchange is used a lot. However, these P2P real estate exchanges also have problems that have not been identified by each other between landlords and tenants. In particular, a research model was established to compare and verify the PBFT (practical Byzantine fault tolerance) algorithm of Hyperledger through the blockchain agreement process. Subsequently, a process for verifying the real estate contract was established. Through VM (virtual machine) research methodology for the verification of blockchain real estate contracts, ElGamal communication was provided to prove quantum cryptography. We also automated lightweight encryption test verification tools and blockchain smart contract VM (virtual machine) models using artificial intelligence. Verification was performed through a reservation server and a monitoring server using a test verification tool for network-based lightweight security IoT (Internet of things) GW (gateway). It presents important ECP (elastic curve program) and elastic curve Qu-Vanstone (ECQV) models among the main functions of the blockchain smart contract, and it is equipped with quantum-based encryption algorithm. In addition, the necessary UML (unified modeling language) source code and performance data were calculated according to the actual experimental environment, and the average value for blockchain for administrative or government authorized assets—4000 TPS (transaction per second) were tested. In the future, we want to use this technology for real estate transactions.
Voting has become one of the methods used by humans to determine decisions. Voting is also often used in determining something that are very important, such as determining people's representative council. In addition, the current voting is still using the Conventional system that uses paper in balloting, and vote counting. This can cause human error. The technology that is increasingly developing in the current era of globalization is e-voting. From this research, an e-vote system will be developed that applies the concept of the block chain node with smart contract. Smart contracts generate unique code for each new election. So that manipulation of election results will not be possible because each voter has only one account and one address block chain. From the results of the test the author can conclude that the smart contract block chain can be used to prove the results of a safe choice and create e-voting that is honest.
Digital streaming also experiencing rapid expansion, the digital streaming application enables us to access and download videos using the existing electronic platform. All this time, services require the content provider to register the copyright to the marketplace or third party. With the existence of blockchain technology makes it possible for the customer to control their data, the available blockchain technology is Smart Contract. Smart Contracts enables instant payment without delay, without obstacles, and without a third party (mediator) which are performed in a decentralized network. Based on the reasons above, this paper will be focusing on a discussion about the smart contract blockchain on digital video streaming application by creating design a streaming video platform with a decentralized peer-to-peer concept.
PT PLN (Persero) as one of the state-owned companies in Indonesia, has the business of selling electricity as one of the core businesses of the company. Business. With customers in 2018 reaching 71.92 million customers, PT PLN (Persero) has entered into a power purchase and purchase contract with customers with the same number of 71.92 million customers. Smart Contracts are expected to be a substitute for written contracts because smart contracts do not require storage space for written documents and are safe from contract changes made by unauthorized parties because they are protected by cryptographic techniques.
In the situation of the Covid-19 plague, many organizations are raising funds to help local governments to obtain additional sources of funds that will be distributed to those in need. Trust is an important factor for the parties involved in raising these funds, both in terms of the funder, the service provider of fundraising platform and even the fundraiser. On this occasion, the author tries to analyze how to implement blockchain technology and smart contracts in the dominant schemes of crowdfunding process. the results of this study indicate that blockchain-based smart contracts can be applied to the dominant schemes of crowdfunding process.
With the rapid development and application of information technology, blockchain technology (BT) has become an important means to promote the integration of the real economy and the digital economy. BT reached a certain level of development for application in asset transactions, finance, and traceability. However, existing technology provides no reasonable trading method and application framework for the use of BT in peer-to-peer (P2P) transactions. This article proposed a blockchain-based P2P transaction method, which we simulated using Go programming language. We apply BT to smart contracts and electronic transactions, and introduce a mechanism of association between digital assets and physical assets. The proposed method can ensure the data security and establish trust among entities. It can also reduce business divergence and costs. For the sensitive data involved in a transaction, we propose an encoding algorithm to prevent the leaks of sensitive data in circulation. The calculations of the matrices of the algorithm can use the computing resources of all nodes in the blockchain to calculate in parallel, and then summarize the results. This makes full use of the massive graphic processing unit resources in the blockchain, and makes the calculation valuable.
Emerging technologies such as Internet of Things (IoT) and blockchain have affected the digital transformation. Blockchain, on the one hand, was initially developed for the purpose of financial trading due to its robustness especially for fault tolerance and cryptographic security in addition to its decentralized architecture. IoT, on the other hand, is an open interconnected network of smart devices able to communicate simultaneously. This arises a challenge in privacy and security, specifically for the data being exchanged. To overcome this, studies have focused on the blockchain to resolve the security and privacy issues of IoT. Indeed, limited studies have proposed to assess blockchain’s viability for IoT and the associated challenges. In this paper, a conceptual model has proposed to identify the crucial factors affecting the adoption of blockchain in IoT. The model consists of four dimensions of factors that we assume will affect the adoption of the two technologies. The dimensions are: attitude-related factors, social influence related factors, data-related factors, and security-related factors. This model is validated through a survey that was distributed between professionals in blockchain and IoT. The findings show a significant impact of data-related factors on the adoption of blockchain in IoT and the intention to use them. The model can play an important role in the development of strategies, standards, and performance assessment.
Bitcoin is widely used and accepted by many countries. The features that are being offered and the positive uprising of its price have made made it popular among its users and investors. The value of Bitcoin started from less than a dollar in 2009 and raking up to over two thousand dollar within 2017. In Indonesia, Bitcoin became popular in 2013; a group of people began to form a community and online forum where people with similar interest can gather and conduct exchange of Bitcoin. In early 2014, the community had formed the first professional Bitcoin brokerage service in Indonesia which also known as bitcoin.co.id and over fifty thousand members were registered. With the daily transaction valuing over five hundred million Rupiah, bitcoin.co.id has made its name on South East Asia. However, despite the positive response in Indonesia, the lack of legal framework regulating cryptocurrencyand the risk of misusing it to fund illicit activity has become a national concern. This paper provides an analysis of legal problems that are being encountered by Indonesia government and thorough comparison with America’s laws on cryptocurrency. By stipulating a law on cryptocurrency, Indonesia’s government would have show support for cryptocurrency in Indonesia through reducing the volatility risk and the possible illicit activities derived from the usage of cryptocurrency.
When the execution of smart contracts fails, the transaction will not be recorded to provide hints for analysts to improve their automated analyzers. To mitigate this, we present ExecuWatch to watch the execution of smart contracts and report the execution details.
Primavera De Filippi, Morshed Mannan, Wessel Reijers
Blockchain technology was created as a response to the trust crisis that swept the world in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. Bitcoin and other blockchain-based systems were presented as a “trustless” alternative to existing financial institutions and even governments. Yet, while the trustless nature of blockchain technology has been heavily questioned, little research has been done as to what blockchain technologies actually bring to the table in place of trust. This article draws from the extensive academic discussion on the concepts of “trust” and “confidence” to argue that blockchain technology is not a ‘trustless technology’ but rather a ‘confidence machine’. First, the article provides a review of the multifaceted conceptualisations of trust and confidence, and the relationship between these two concepts. Second, the claim is made that blockchain technology relies on cryptographic rules, mathematics, and game-theoretical incentives in order to increase confidence in the operations of a computational system. Yet, such an increase in confidence ultimately relies on the proper operation and governance of the underlying blockchain-based network, which requires trusting a variety of actors. Third, the article turns to legal, constitutional and polycentric governance theory to explore the governance challenges of blockchain-based systems, in light of the tension between procedural confidence and trust.
Dulani Jayasuriya Daluwathumullagamage, Alexandra Sims
There is considerable hype about blockchain in almost every industry, including finance, with significant investments globally. We conduct a systematic review of 851 records and construct a final article sample of 183 for the sample period 2012 to 2020 to identify relevant factors for blockchain adoption in corporate governance. We conduct textual and empirical analysis to develop a decentralized autonomous governance framework and link traditional corporate governance theories to blockchain adoption. Furthermore, we explore present and future use cases and implications of blockchains in corporate governance. Using our systematic review and textual analysis, we further identify gaps and common trends between prior academic and industry literature. Moreover, for our empirical analysis, we compile a unique database of blockchain investments to forecast future investments. In addition, we explore blockchain potential in corporate governance during and post COVID-19. We find prior academic articles to mostly focus on regulation (49 studies) and Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) (46 studies), while industry articles tend to concentrate on exchanges (10 studies) and cryptocurrencies (9 articles). A significant growth in literature is observed for 2017 and 2018. Finally, we provide behavioural, regulatory, ethical and managerial perspectives of blockchain adoption in corporate governance.
Summary We provide a high‐level view on topics addressed in scientific articles about regulatory technology (RegTech), with a particular focus on technologies used. For this purpose, we first explore different denominations for RegTech and derive search queries to search relevant literature portals. From the hits of that information retrieval process, we select 55 articles outlining the application of information technology in regulatory affairs with an emphasis on the financial sector. In comparison, we examine the technological scope of 347 RegTech companies and compare our findings with the scientific literature. Our research reveals that ‘compliance management’ is the most relevant topic in practice, and ‘risk management’ is the primary subject in research. The most significant technologies as of today are ‘artificial intelligence’ and distributed ledger technologies such as ‘blockchain’.
Abstract As a new technology, blockchain can be used to analyse and process the data through the effective integration of financial resources. New financial formats or service models are produced to upgrade the financial system and promote the efficiency and quality of financial operations and service from three layers (data, rules, and application) based on customers' needs. The blockchain technology can help the financial industry to automatically and accurately identify customer credit conditions, restructure the financial market credit system, and improve the efficiency of cross‐border payment. Meanwhile, it also posed a challenge for the financial industries' development. In this paper, we systematically analysed the blockchain technology and its application in the financial and economic field and the status quo and the challenges. Finally, we provided constructive suggestions to facilitate the blockchain technology development in the financial and economic field.
Direct bartering allows for the trading of assets with or without the use of money. In this paper, we introduce a smart contract written in the Solidity language for the Ethereum blockchain that implements a distributed and autonomous direct barter exchange operated by crowds. Since ERC20 smart contract tokens are widely used for initial coin offerings (ICOs), our implementation provides autonomous bartering services for ERC20 tokens. The non-fungible ERC721 token, as well as Ethereum Name Service (ENS) name bartering, are also supported. Because finding a feasible bartering solution for bids involving multiple tokens is NP-hard in general, our exchange only provides escrow and swapping services. It assumes feasible solutions are submitted by bartering problem solvers from the crowd who run a solver locally on their machines. Bartering problem solvers are incentivized to submit solutions to the autonomous exchange by awarding them with excess tokens that are left over after granting the bidders the tokens they requested in their bids. Our system, called BarterMachine, can perhaps be used to facilitate a global barter economy. The BarterMachine prototype is available for testing on the Ethereum Ropsten network at https://bartermachine.github.io/bartermachine/ropsten/.
To name or explain an IS phenomenon one often selectively integrates features from one or more concepts from domains familiar to end users. Consider “smart contract”, which integrates features from two domains: IT and law. However, such selective feature integration often remains implicit to its users, resulting in ambiguous features of novel IS concepts. This ambiguity can be opportunistically exploited. A prominent case, reported in this paper, is a hacker’s interpretation of a “smart contract”, who equated exploiting vulnerabilities in code to using terms and conditions in a legal contract. In so doing s/he legitimized, towards the Ethereum community, gaining a significant amount of cryptocurrencies. The contribution of this research in progress paper is to propose conceptual blending, an approach from cognitive linguistics, for systematically analyzing possible interpretations of IS concepts. For illustration purposes, we employ the aforementioned “smart contract” case and present two blends: a prima facie interpretation, and an authorial intent blend. In our focus on analyzing interpretations of IS concepts, this paper constitutes a first step in a larger project aiming at using instruments from cognitive linguistics for discourse analysis in the field of IS.
In recent years, the blockchain technology has matured and established new opportunities in the digital world. With the release of the Blockchain 2.0, the Ethereum Network and smart contracts, it is now possible to operate applications decentralized and independently. These applications promise lower transaction costs, better efficiency and higher security. However, there is still a lack of in-depth understanding and standardization within the variety of recently developed smart contracts. In addition, there is still no proper taxonomy that structures the technical elements of a smart contract and makes them comparable. Hence, we develop a smart contract taxonomy using an inductive research approach. Following Nickerson et al. (2013) we analyze the smart contracts of 47 gambling DApps to identify the 18 dimensions and 41 characteristics of your technical and code-based taxonomy. In future research, we will continue to expand the developed taxonomy and include other application areas. Finally, a general taxonomy for research and product development will be available to science and practice, ensuring a consistent and standardized implementation of smart contracts.
Claire Ingram Bogusz, Christofer Laurell, Christian Sandström
A vibrant development is currently taking place in entrepreneurial finance due to the field's digital evolution over recent years. This article aims to assess the interplay between four of the key phenomena that has fuelled this development, namely crowdfunding, blockchain technologies, cryptocurrencies, and initial coin offerings (ICOs). By making use of social media analytics, public discussions on social media concerning crowdfunding, blockchain technologies, cryptocurrencies, and ICOs have been systematically tracked in social media over three time periods between the May 6, 2017, and October 2, 2018. In doing so, a total of 197 770 captured posts across social media platforms have been collected and analyzed. The results illustrate that discussions on blockchain technologies dominated the interplay in the first analyzed time period, that discussions on cryptocurrencies and ICOs dominated the interplay in the second analyzed time period, while discussions concerning blockchain technologies, cryptocurrencies, and ICOs highly converge in the third time period. By illustrating this shift over the analyzed time periods and by offering a systematic exploration of key characteristics of the interplay at hand, this article adds to previous literature on entrepreneurial finance by providing an empirical contribution which details the coevolution of these phenomena in recent years.
Corporations and other forms of business organizations can be supplemented with blockchain-based agency constructs. Blockchain-based decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) expand the definition of the firm. On-chain DAO governance enables dynamic regulatory features that facilitate unprecedented decentralized regulatory solutions.
Denni Arli, Patrick van Esch, Marat Bakpayev, Andrea Laurence
Purpose In this study, we focus on consumer perceptions of cryptocurrencies. We hypothesize that knowledge of cryptocurrencies, trust in government, and the speed of transactions are the main factors contributing to consumers' trust in cryptocurrencies. Design/methodology/approach 451 MTurk workers, a convenient sample incentivized with a small monetary payment, participated in a cross-sectional online study with cryptocurrencies serving as the focal product category. Findings We obtained support for our hypothesized notion that knowledge of cryptocurrencies, trust in government, and the speed of transactions are the main factors contributing to consumers' trust in cryptocurrencies. Our research makes several important theoretical contributions. First, we demonstrate that consumers who understand and know how cryptocurrencies work are more likely to trust and invest in the currency. Next, we demonstrate that consumers are more likely to trust cryptocurrencies and their peer-to-peer transactions if, preferably, they take place via a central issuer and are regulated by their respective governments. Originality/value This study is the first known paper to focus on cryptocurrencies from the consumers' perspective. Next, we identify key antecedents of trust towards cryptocurrencies. Second, we reveal the role of government concerning cryptocurrencies. Finally, FinTech firms and banks (should they choose to enter the cryptocurrency market) need not spend time and money on marketing, advertising, and promotions in order to try to allay consumers' anxiety when it comes to their uptake in the different digital currencies. Rather, this would allow the FinTech firms and banks to allocate resources to focus their attention on marketing, advertising and promoting the factors (i.e. knowledge, trust in government, and speed of transaction) that drive intent to invest in cryptocurrencies.
Purpose This paper aims to look at shifts in internet-related content and services economies, from audience labour economies to Web 2.0 user-generated content, and the emerging model of user computing power utilisation, powered by blockchain technologies. The authors look at and test three models of user computing power utilisation based on distributed computing (Coinhive, Cryptotab and Gridcoin) two of which use cryptocurrency mining through distributed pool mining techniques, while the third is based on distributed computing of calculations for scientific research. The three models promise benefits to their users, which the authors discuss throughout the paper, studying how they interplay with the three levels of the digital divide. Design/methodology/approach The goal of this article is twofold as follows: first to discuss how using the mining hype may reduce digital inequalities, and secondly to demonstrate how these services offer a new business model based on value rewarding in exchange for computational power, which would allow more online opportunities for people, and thus reduce digital inequalities. Finally, this contribution discusses and proposes a method for a fair revenue model for content and online service providers that uses user device computing resources or computational power, rather than their data and attention. The method is represented by a model that allows for consensual use of user computing resources in exchange for accessing content and using software tools and services, acting essentially as an alternative online business model. Findings Allowing users to convert their devices’ computational power into value, whether through access to services or content or receiving cryptocurrency and payments in return for providing services or content or direct computational powers, contributes to bridging digital divides, even at fairly small levels. Secondly, the advent of blockchain technologies is shifting power relations between end-users and content developers and service providers and is a necessity for the decentralisation of internet and internet services. Originality/value The article studies the effect of services that rely on distributed computing and mining on digital inequalities, by looking at three different case studies – Coinhive, Gridcoin and Cryptotab – that promise to provide value in return for using computing resources. The article discusses how these services may reduce digital inequalities by affecting the three levels of the digital divide, namely, access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) (first level), skills and motivations in using ICTs (second level) and capacities in using ICTs to get concrete benefits (third level).
Abstract A recent wave of scholarship attests that the liberal world order is under threat. Although there is disagreement about the underlying reasons for this diagnosis, there are few attempts to further our understanding of how the liberal order can be reinvigorated. This paper probes the potential of blockchain technology to promote international cooperation. Blockchain technology is a data structure that enables global governance stakeholders to establish decentralized governance systems which provide high-powered incentives for enhanced cooperation. By outlining the contours of a blockchain-based global governance system for climate policy, the paper illustrates that blockchain technology holds theoretical promise to foster cooperation in three ways: leveraging new sources of information through blockchain-based prediction markets; allaying coordinating problems through reducing the cost of transactions for side payments; and allowing states and other global governance actors to make more credible commitments given guaranteed execution of blockchain-enabled smart contracts. By empowering local knowledge holders and non-state actors that traditionally lacked the means to coordinate efforts to influence global politics, blockchain technology also promises to advance an international order based on liberal values. In actuality, however, emerging blockchain-based global governance systems will fall short of the libertarian ideal of ‘fully-automated liberalism’ as their design and operation will remain under the shadow of power.
In the last few years, the world has witnessed a fast expansion of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. From being mostly associated with criminal activity in their earliest years, cryptocurrencies have now taken a step into the legal business markets. The increased use of cryptocurrencies in business and commercial transactions entails that their appearance in the insolvency proceedings can be expected in a foreseeable future. However, the fast development of cryptocurrencies means that the current regulatory frameworks around the world have not kept up with the changes, which is especially noticeable in international situations. The continuous growth of cryptocurrencies and their value indicate that they will become very interesting for insolvency practitioners in the future, but the lack of regulation and case law within this field raises the question of how they will and should be treated. \n \nWhile cryptocurrencies continue to find their place in modern society, whether and to what extent they should be regulated in the international insolvency law is a vastly approaching issue. This thesis discusses the possibility of regulating cryptocurrencies on the international level of the insolvency law by examining firstly, the different risks and issues that the cryptocurrencies will give rise to in the insolvency law and insolvency proceedings with a special focus on jurisdiction, secondly, the current regulatory frameworks and principles on international and European Union level and lastly, the possibilities of regulation through both soft law and hard law in order to create a way to approach these problems. The possibility of regulation will be discussed in a multidisciplinary light, with the principles of international financial law as well as the nature of blockchain-based technology taken into consideration. \n \nThe aim of the thesis is not to come up with a specific course of action, but rather to enlighten the most prominent pros and cons of different possibilities. The potential ways of regulation brought up in the thesis are the use of blockchain technology itself, amendment of existing legal frameworks, the use of regulatory sandboxes and a new legal framework.