Blockchain between "inefficient method" and "great solution" for the Central Banks

Blockchain is already being implemented by some Central Banks to improve internal processes and payment systems. Two of them, the Dutch Central Bank and the Central Bank of South Africa, have already revealed the first results after adding this technology, which could not be more different.

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The Dutch bank announced that the blockchain technology was insufficient for the payment infrastructure presented by the financial institution. De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB), said that Blockchain did not have enough capacity to cover the large volumes of transactions that should be processed every day.

"The current payment systems are very efficient, can handle large volumes and provide legal certainty of payment. The proven Blockchain solutions show that they are not efficient enough in terms of costs and energy consumption and can not handle a large number of transactions, "the bank said in an official statement.

This conclusion was reached after Dukaton, a project in charge of testing different DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology), in the banking system, will experiment with a prototype based on Blockchain.

Although most of the companies that have used block chains to improve their internal processes have had a satisfactory experience, and even the DNB admits that this technology can bring benefits against external attacks, considers that it is done at the expense of "scalability" , capacity and efficiency ".

However, it does not rule out the possibility of using Blockchain technology if in the future an algorithm is developed that can meet all the demands of the Dutch financial system.

In a very different place in the world, Blockchain was also used to improve the banking system. The Reserve Bank of South Africa (SARB), announced that the 14-week test using blockchain technology had been carried out successfully and yielded excellent results. The almost 70,000 transactions carried out daily in the country were processed in just 2 hours, with an average of 1-2 per operation.

Despite the great improvement in the financial sector, the SARB has no plans to replace the existing Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system with Blockchain, at least not at the moment. The institution insists that more tests and regulatory mechanisms are still needed.

"Key considerations that need to be addressed include the evaluation of support frameworks and other systems that are integrated with the RTGS system, as well as legal, regulatory and compliance factors ... A fully live DLT payment system is not currently planned in South Africa, "the institution said, reports CoinDesk .

Undoubtedly, Blockchain represents a technological breakthrough, which brings multiple benefits. However, it is still not enough for large banking institutions to consider replacing their current systems with this DLT.

Blockchain must still improve and continue to develop before it can be definitively considered as a leading technology in the world.