When correctly used, blockchain and cryptocurrency offer the chance to instantly engage, without a middleman, on your own terms. Peer to peer. Or in other words, these technologies can set the ability for two people to write their own rules during types of trusted payment and exchange
Distributed ledger technologies (DLT), can fundamentally realize a methodology of decentralized, immutable data as well as transaction accounting, permitting reallocation’s of trust. As we hold, this reallocation is one where trust is moved from centralized institutions and associated fiat currencies into the hands of private participants because such implemented and anonymized ledgers (records of transactions), are immutable and distributed. Ideally it’s the creation of peer-to-peer collaboration security standards with an authority previously only attributable to centralized institutions
Released in March, 2019, a World Economic Forum (WEF) whitepaper outlines the development and rise of central bank digital currencies (CBDC). These central digital currency types are hailed as expediting settlement times, adding to processing security and streamlining various bank as well as inter-bank transactions
Today, from Brazil to Lithuania [and seemingly everywhere in-between], numerous centralized financial institutions are actively working to incorporate DLT. Following setup costs, incorporation of secure accounting and exchange standards can, for most any financial business or operation, possibly bring numerous benefits [197]
However the very title, distributed, speaks to a form of decentralized agency that may already be actively degraded
An appropriation of DLT by centralized services may be held to negate the arguably required opportunity of systemic or foundational service enhancement [199] Same system, new set of technologies
In a move towards “semi-monetization” [194] control of funds becomes borrowing of central currency, never privately owned. Centralized institutions disparaging of non-centralized DLT can be seen as the same groups eventual re-sale of the exact systems that blockchain and cryptocurrency are capable to potentially disrupt
As the JPM coin still uses centralized input and withdrawal through JPM accounts having DLT tacked on to the back-end, the possible illogical assumptions of the JPM Coin somehow adding speed or security to in-house activities through this increasing of processing stages was earlier mentioned [real coin]. Here the WEF report extols a total of ten benefits to these newly minted central bank digital currencies (CBDC);
i. Retail of CBDC
“…operated and settled in a peer-to-peer and decentralized manner (no intermediary)… serves as a compliment or substitute for physical cash…”
ii. Wholesale of CBDC
“…available only for commercial banks and clearing houses for use in the wholesale interbank market”
iii. Interbank securities settlement
“…where two parties trading an asset, such as a security for cash, can conduct the payment for and delivery of the asset simultaneously”
iv. Payment system resiliency and contingency
“…primary or back-up domestic interbank payment and settlement system to provide safety and continuity…”
v. Bond issuance and lifecycle management
“…may be applied to bonds issued and managed by sovereign states, international organizations or government agencies. Central banks or government regulators could be “observer nodes” to monitor activity where relevant”
vi. Know-your-customer and anti-money-laundering
“May connect to a digital national identity platform or plug into pre-existing e-KYC or AML systems. Could potentially interact with CBDC as part of payments and financial activity tracking”
vii. Information exchange and data sharing
“The use of distributed or decentralized databases to create alternative systems for information and data sharing between or within related government or private sector institutions”
viii. Trade finance
“…Customer information and transaction histories are shared between participants in the decentralized database while maintaining private and confidentiality where needed”
ix. Cash and money supply chain
“The use of DLT for issuing, tracking and managing the delivery and movement of cash from production facilities to the central bank and commercial bank branches; could include the ordering, depositing or movement of funds, and could simplify regulatory reporting”
x. Customer SEPA Creditor Identifier (SCI) provisioning
“Blockchain-based decentralized sharing repository for SEPA credit identifiers managed by the central bank and commercial banks in the SEPA debiting scheme. Faster, streamlined and decentralized system for identity provisioning and sharing”
Nowhere are impassioned rationales for only a centralized selection of actions more clearly extolled than in discussions around AML and KYC requirements relating to purported use of illegal narcotics and various ‘DarkNet’ statistics
Often peppered into discussions, emotive incentives for rush judgements towards bolstering of only centralized systems are frequently made. It is however worthwhile to consider:
i) Officially sanctioned psychotropic substances — namely alcohol and tobacco — account for more medical costs, violent crimes, deaths and social damage than all illegal narcotics combined [202]
ii) The recent opioid epidemic [200] was brought about through centralized industries [pharmaceutical, government and medical] push and prescription methodology [201] with the pills that have been causing so much damage derived from patented formulas
iii) To ‘knowing your customer’ and ‘anti-money laundering’ — as one example from immediate memory HSBC recently paid fines for flagrant violations involving the cartels. It appears they face no jail time, pending indictments, cessation nor limitation to scope of core operations despite evidenced, repeated nonobservance [203]
It further remains absolutely possible to repeat say the Libor scandal, with DLT permitting now faster transactions, as technologies and thus accountability come under centralized control. The issue of prosecution or reprimand is seemingly determined by the size of available resources and the selection of channels implemented, not the action [crime] itself
This is not an endorsement. It is to state the facts arising from analysis so as to attribute credit to genuine sources of realized and sustained costs within the contexts of reviewing arguments towards centralized system improvement or continuation
While the greed and uncertainty exemplified through ICO’s alongside various associated ‘blockchain bubbles’ bolsters centralized counter arguments, these conveniently overlook some practical fundamentals
As not all blockchain or DLT systems permit the type of transactions banks are presently structured to process, then blockchain and DLT itself are argued to require tailoring accordingly [197] For the spotlight to focus on a market’s comparatively nominal early financial missteps, the broader sociological implications become any erosion in credibility of independent [other] DLT networks or systems working to justify only the existence of centralized DLT
Looking at the mistakes that such independent agents have made, while the banks are still in operation, is presented as all the more reason to allow the banks to next take control of DLT, continuing as normal
Blockchain can have the capacity to set terms, value and tangible exchange independent of centralized institutions. Yet centralization of processes means that participant’s choice in rule definition, adherence and subsequent enacted effect become just a selection from centrally mandated operations
Take established, actively traded cryptocurrency, presently reasonably held as representing some used stores of value like Bitcoin, Ethereum or Monero. In using any of these three an, albeit imperfect, capacity for instant settlement and transfers between users [peers] exists
The principle under contention is a slow removal of any currency type that retains convertibility outside of centralized institutions
Disappearance of such omits consumer’s independent choice of alternatives with the resulting centrally authorized value stores or “abstract wealth” [195] being held in only centrally authorized accounts
Experiments in pure centralized control have historically not fared well [194] Earlier failures have partially come from centralized mediation inherently slowing processing whilst limiting data types and sources, a precept in direct contrast with the possible achievable benefits of DLT. Testing centralized [digital currency] control could prove comparable, irrespective of technologies implemented
TOF® upholds isolated, personally applicable and finite parameters which have been self-selected by actual participants. Such allows for ad hoc implementation of centralized institutions, again at participant’s discretion
It is further possible to permit encrypted, private and direct payment exchange which is publicly anonymized on DLT networks and then independently enacted through use of either fiat or cryptocurrencies, as with the RWSC®. Here conversion does not omit fiat currency, transmission instead inverts sources of valuation in exchange to make both exchange and valuation execution privately controlled
TOF® presents the Biosphere as a practicable alternative. Externally, we can simply caution selection with a conscious awareness of potential consequences. In deciding how best to proceed, as always, choice remains yours for as long as you decide it does
Absent conscious awareness, over time the range of external choices may be almost imperceptibly culled by centralized control of DLT
Learning curves throughout peer-to-peer adoption of these technologies can become popular propaganda, echoing votes towards only repetition of centralized structures whom then assume a redefined authority by control of distributed ledger technologies
To put it another way, because people and capacities for financial exchange may become independently decentralized, concurrently such independent choice by participants may not be centrally held as valid. From a centralized viewpoint, aside from some technical benefits and enhanced capacities, this scenario may be a strategy for survival
