Citi’s decision to pull the plug on its crypto project underlines industry-wide concerns about the thin rewards from blockchain efforts. Blockchain’s potential as a game-changer has seen financial institutions (FIs) invest heavily in the technology: In 2017 alone, the industry spent $1.7 billion on the nascent technology, per Greenwich Associates. Yet, while some participants have begun to make headway, such as HSBC and JPMorgan, CitiCoin is illustrative of the many other players that failed to move from testing to live implementation.
In part, this is likely because replacing entrenched systems like SWIFT would require participants to significantly overhaul their existing infrastructure and operations — a lift that is unlikely to pay off, in the short term at least, by adopting blockchain. For now, we’re likely to see other FIs adopt Citi’s strategy of focusing on deploying blockchain to solve very specific pain points — like trade finance — and working to improve other processes through alternative means.
Read More.. Source Business Insider