HONG KONG, CN: SWIFT in association with Accenture unveils a new paper investigating on the applications of Distributed Ledger Technology (DLTs) in financial services.  The paper offers an in-depth analysis of opportunities and challenges faced in leveraging DLT across financial sector.

The study is a blueprint of what criteria must be met for its own services to include a distributed ledger offering.

SWIFT and Accenture identified eight critical areas where distributed ledger technology needs to be further improved before it can be adopted on an industry-wide basis. Those areas are governance, data controls, compliance with regulatory requirements, standardization, identity framework, security, reliability and scalability.

In identifying the gaps, SWIFT also acknowledged the industry'sinterest in building technical and operational platform for DLT based services.

In outlining the gaps in distributed ledger technology, SWIFT and Accenture also identified its strengths. Distributed ledgers can efficiently keep a full network up-to-date with the latest information; data flow on distributed ledgers is highly traceable; and local access to complete and verified data can ease reconciliation. In addition, participants can trust the authenticity of data on the ledger without involvement of a central body. Transactions are digitally signed, and the ledger's distributed nature makes it highly resilient.

"Since the emergence of DLTs, the financial services industry has been looking for answers to questions about the potential use of these new technologies," says Fabian Vandenreydt, Head of Securities, Innotribe and the SWIFT Institute, SWIFT. "The technology assessment has given us valuable insights into the necessary requirements for DLTs to succeed in financial services. It provides a clear state-of-play, outlining the different factors the technology needs to address, and the current maturity of DLTs in each of these areas. SWIFT is committed working with its community to identify areas in which the technology can provide the greatest benefits, evolving at a pace that works for each customer."