ICICI Bank first Indian lender to execute Blockchain transaction

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ICICI Bank has become the first Indian lender to complete a banking transaction using Blockchain technology. This remittance transaction has been completed in partnership with Emirates NBD, a lender from the West Asia. India’s largest private sector lender has managed to authenticate remittance transaction messages as well as original international trade documents related to purchase order, invoice, shipping and insurance, etc electronically on Blockchain in real time. Blockchain technology simplifies the process and drastically reduces duration of the transaction to few minutes, compared with few days otherwise.

“I envision that the emerging technology of Blockchain will play a significant role in banking in the coming years by making complex bilateral and multi-lateral banking transactions seamless, quick and more secure,” said Chanda Kochhar, MD & CEO, ICICI Bank.

She said the bank will also look at expanding the Blockchain ecosystem and creating common working standards for commercial adoption of the technology.

Blockchain allows one to change the age-old process of maintaining a ledger that can be accessed only by one party. Blockchain puts in place a distributed ledger that allows a participatory model. A recent PwC survey stated that banks and financial institutions are increasingly looking at adopting and implementing Blockchain to improve efficiency.