JPM Morgan Chase testing Blockchain transactions, Telegram has 200 Million Users
America’s largest bank; JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) tested a $150 million certificate of deposit (CD) transaction on its Quorum blockchain solution.
JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE), and the Western Asset Management Company participated in the actual $150 million Yankee CD, American Banker reported. JPMorgan’s Blockchain Center of Excellence tested a mock transaction of a debt issuance in the same amount through the Quorum blockchain to see if it was possible on 21 April 2018.
Quorum is supposed to be part of an interbank payments platform that will include; the Australia and New Zealand Banking Group, (ANZ) and the Royal Bank of Canada (NYSE: RY), American Banker reported. There have been unconfirmed rumors that Chase will spin Quorum off into a separate company.
Banks Developing Separate Payment System
The Yankee CD enables banks to raise money from US investors. It can also be called a depository receipt and is part of an alternative system for interbank payments.
Quorum differs from the Utility Settlement Coin (USC) being developed by a consortium of banks that includes Santander (NYSE: SAN) and BNY Mellon (NYSE: BK). The USC would use a cryptocurrency to send interbank payments through the blockchain, Quorum uses debt instruments.
The Quorum test is very similar to the Jibrel Network (JNT) which will use the Ethereum blockchain to transmits debt instruments known as cryptocurrency depository receipts or CryDRs. The CryDRs are designed to be cheaper and faster than standard depository receipts and can be purchased with Jibrel’s JNT ERC20-protocol token.
Jibrel is testing a solution called jCash that will enable the purchase of CryDRs with US Dollars, Pound Sterling, Rubbles, Euros, Yuan and United Arab Emirates Dirham (AED). The Swiss-based company is also testing a standalone cryptocurrency wallet that is supposed to be safer than other solutions and plans the Jibrel DAO, a marketplace for CryDRs.
At least one central bank is looking into the possibility of integrating its real-time gross-settlement service (RTGS) with the blockchain, Digital Trends reported. Use of the blockchain would eliminate the waiting periods for one-time RTGS transactions Bank of England governor Mark Carney told the press.
Goldman Sachs has hired experienced crypto trader Justin Schmidt as its Vice President of Digital Asset Markets, Tearsheet reported. The bank claims it has no plans for a crypto trading desk, but it is exploring blockchain markets.
Telegram has 200 million users
Telegram; the popular encrypted social messaging solution (SMS) planning the $1.7 billion TON initial cryptocurrency offering, claims to have 200 million users.
A blog entry by CEO Pavel Durov claims Telegram hit the 200 million user mark on 22 March 2018. “If Telegram were a country, it would have been the sixth largest country in the world,” Durov boasted.
Durov’s claim is realistic, Telegram had 180 million users in December 2017, Statista reported. Telegram’s footprint has more than doubled in less than three years; back in September 2015, the solution had just 60 million users.
Telegram is still small potatoes as social networks go. The largest SMS solution Facebook’s (NASDAQ: FB) WhatsApp had 1.5 billion users in December 2017 according to our friends at Statista.
