Over 50 Banks Simulate Letter of Credit Transactions on R3’s Blockchain in 27 Countries

Over 50 banks participated in the simulation of letter of credit transactions on R3’s blockchain platform in 27 countries on six continents. The company announced the development in a press release published on May 8.

Per the release, 96% of the participants said that the system — dubbed Voltron — will accelerate and reduce the cost of their letters of credits procedure. Furthermore, 86% of them reportedly believe the inefficiencies of the traditional system are becoming intolerable.

The company claims that Voltron cuts the execution time of the procedure from 5-10 days to under 24 hours. R3 states that, as a result of the adoption of the new system, 61% said that they are likely to move trade flows to “open account,” an option which is reportedly riskier for exporters.

The participants of the six-weeks-long trial reportedly include CIB, MUFG, National Bank of Egypt, RBI, Standard Bank and Societe Generale. The system was delivered through a partnership of Bain, CryptoBLK and R3 on Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform. Voltron is designed to be compatible with both Corda and Corda Enterprise, aiming to replace the traditional finance links and networks with a shared ledger.

As Cointelegraph reported in March, United Kingdom-based banking giant HSBC is seeking banking partners in South Korea to deploy Voltron in the country.

Kuala Lumpur-based Bursa Malaysia, the country’s stock exchange, is also working on a blockchain-enabled security borrowing and lending proof-of-concept in partnership with Hong Kong-based Forms Syntron Information, the stock exchange’s technology partner.