Blockchain: This House Believes It's The Future

Blockchain: This House Believes It's The Future
Debate & Discussion

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Blockchain has leapt to prominence as the technology underpinning Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Blockchain technology creates a digital distributed ledger of records stored in blocks cryptographically linked to one another in a way that makes them virtually unchangeable. It has been developed across many sectors, including consumer goods and retail, manufacturing, oil and gas, trade, shipping, and property. In Financial services however, blockchain has not yet been adopted to the extent many had expected or predicted. The creation of blockchain technology introduced many advantages, providing increased security in trustless environments. However, its decentralised nature may have limited efficiency and require increased storage capacity.

Join us for an interactive debate and a vote on the outcome. We are delighted to have the following experts and practitioners arguing for and against Blockchain:

For The Proposition:

David G.W Birch, is an author, adviser and commentator on digital financial services. He is Global Ambassador for Consult Hyperion (the secure electronic transactions consultancy that he helped to found), Technology Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Financial Innovation (the London-based think tank), a Visiting Professor at the University of Surrey Business School and holds a number of board-level advisory roles. Before helping to found Consult Hyperion in 1986, he spent several years working as a consultant in Europe, the Far East and North America. He graduated from the University of Southampton with a B.Sc (Hons.) in Physics.

Daniel Evans, Senior Manager for Group Development and Strategy, Gibraltar Stock Exchange Group. Daniel was part of the team which started the Gibraltar Stock Exchange (GSX). In August 2010 he started working with Bitcoin. In November 2015 Daniel wrote the “Crypto Securities Exchange” proposal to integrate blockchain technology into the GSX.

For The Opposition:

Tim Jones CBE is Executive Director, TATA Limited, representing the TATA Group in London. Tim’s background spans retail banking and payments, institutional stockbroking and pensions. He also currently serves as a Non-Executive Director of the Money and Pensions Service in the UK. Tim Spent 17 years at NatWest and was heavily involved in the development of Switch and Maestro debit card products. He was also a Director of SWIFT UK Ltd and Co-invented and then developed Mondex digital cash from 1990 - 96.

Virginie O’Shea is a capital markets FinTech research specialist, with two decades of experience in tracking financial technology developments in the sector, with a particular focus on regulatory developments, data and standards. Most recently, she was a research director with Aite Group, heading up the Institutional Securities & Investments practice and covering data management, collateral management, legal entity onboarding, and post-trade technology. In this role she spearheaded strategy for the practice and managed a team of eight analysts across the globe.

Chair - Hugh Morris, Chief Executive Officer, ChainZy.

AGENDA