Creating a blockchain corsortium
Course ID: CBC0096.18
Objective: Blockchain is a technology which requires a network. Many Banks and Financial organizations have created or attempted to create consortiums around blockchain technology. As a Bank, learn what makes a consortium work.
Duration: 30 hours
Topic Level: Advanced
Topics are:
1) Governance aspects of a blockchain consortium
- Define Founding Members
- Define Governing board
- Decide Composition of the Governing board: Consists of Founding members and Participating members (non-founding members)
- Define Participating Members (or Non-founding members)
- Define Non-Member participants- such as other banks or corporates
- Define Admittance rules of Participating members to Governing Board
- Define Governing Board decision process
Many more topics...
2) Operational Aspects of a Blockchain consortium
- Include if everyone can maintain their own private record of the shared ledger
- Include Participants can selectively share information on a need-to-know basis, eg: limited to the counterparties to a transaction and the regulator as required.
- Define how the platform will provide the capability to keep all parameters of a transaction hidden from all but the intended counterparties as required by use-case. Broadcasting of transactions will be limited to the counterparties of the transaction.
- Define node service model: Participants may or may not hold a node in the blockchain network
- Define if participants can have their node located on a server located anywhere in the world
- Define clusters (a group of nodes maintaining the blockchain data): based on regulatory guidelines within a national and/or regulatory boundary
- Define Immutability: once a transaction is committed to the blockchain it can neither be changed nor removed. This requires all transactions to be fully verifiable via cryptographic techniques such as Merkle trees or incremental hashes
Many more topics...
3) Platform aspects of the Blockchain consortium
- Define how smart contracts are linked with real world contracts (including hashing options), and how validation is carried out to ensure consistency between them
- Define capabilities for interfacing with information feeds
- Define capabilities for interoperability with other shared ledger platforms and legacy systems
- Define how the technical design will prevent any breach of the consortium’s operating rules – whether by the technical operator or by participants on the shared ledger
- Define how to achieve compliance with applicable regulatory requirements – and in financial services, this may include considerations around redundancy and other technology matters which could impact on the stability of the relevant financial markets.
Many more topics...
4) Additional Consideration
- Define if consortium activities on a private shared ledger would be exempt from competition/antitrust laws. Consortium activity can constitute cartel conduct if the structure fails to incorporate appropriate compliance and enforcement measures.
- Define if consortium members should preemptively seek authorisation from the Competition and Consumer regulatory bodies.
Many more topics covered...