The Deputy Chairman of Russia’s central bank has poured cold water on the frenzied buzz surrounding blockchain, opining that the innovation is still years away from being adopted by the banking industry. Speaking at a banking conference that focused on Russian banks in the 21st century, today, Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank of Russia – Olga Skorobogatova weighed in on the notable interest surrounding blockchain technology by those in the financial industry. Skorobogatova underlined 2015 as the year that saw an “explosion” of interest in distributed ledger technology. However, she then stated that regulators and companies who were observing the innovation discovered risks and imperfections, upon closer research, as reported by Bankir.Ru. While Skorobogatova did not reveal what those findings were, she then added: The myth of blockchain that everything is ready and you can move, reduce costs and give up the bank, it turned out to be a myth. It would take an additional 3-4 years to study and understand the technology, Skorobogatova argued. It is to be noted that Skorobogatova isn’t a critic of blockchain technology. To the contrary, the Deputy Chairman has previously stated that blockchain technology could transcend its potential beyond bitcoin, by proving to be a distributed storage of data. During that blockchain conference in April 2016, Skorobogatova was also of the view that a ‘hybrid’ network of both public (open) or private characteristics of blockchain could create a distributed ledger that could birth a national digital currency in the future. During that conference, Skorobogatova also suggested that a Russian blockchain consortium “in the image and likeliness” of R3 be formed to explore applications of the technology in Russia. The central bank official also spoke about technologies that the banking sector could benefit from. They included cloud, biometric data, IoT, big data and artificial intelligence, among others. Disclaimer: All translations are unofficial. Images from Shutterstock.
The notion of blockchain disrupting the banking industry is a " myth " , according to Chairman of the Central chamber of Russia , Olga Skorobogatova . speaking at a conference , she said that examining distributed ledger technology had found " risks and imperfections " , and a further three or four years would be needed to understand its implications . Skorobogatova has previously praised blockchain , saying it could " transcend its potential beyond expectations . " During the same conference , Skorobogatova suggested the creation of a Russian consortium along the lines of R3 .