“It’s more curiosity, support to explore the technology and interest in how it could help the industry,” she adds.
However, the potential to improve transparency in the investment industry only works as long as users and investors believe the information on the digital ledger is accurate. Accenture, the digital consulting company, recently patented a tool that would allow users to edit entries on the blockchain.
“Tools like Accenture’s would essentially defeat blockchain’s purpose of being a permanent digital history of activity. I really don’t understand why they felt the need to come out with that technology because the whole point is transparency,” Ms Yurisich explains.
“If something needs to be corrected, you go in and create an offsetting entry to correct and back out the trade. I can’t imagine the regulator in particular is going to want that functionality of being able to go in and edit entries.”
Once a regulatory framework is in place and the technology can meet the scale of the asset management industry, then blockchain could become a staple in financial services.
Ms Yurisich said: “You’ll definitely start to see mass adoption once some of these issues get addressed.”
