According to the corporation, Standard Chartered (StanChart) has built a blockchain-powered trade finance platform with Chinese supply chain finance technology supplier Linklogis.
According to a story published on August 30 by The Korea Herald, the platform, which will be known as Olea, would endeavor to address the needs of institutional investors that are “looking for opportunities in an alternative asset class with businesses that require supply chain financing.”
The joint venture that will operate the platform will have its headquarters in Singapore, and Amelia Ng, the CEO of StanChart’s SC Ventures, will serve as its chairman and CEO. Letitiat Chau, Linklogis’ vice chairman and chief risk officer, will act as the company’s deputy chief executive and president.
In 2020, StanChart became Linklogis’ first global bank investor, a year after the two companies signed a letter of understanding to collaborate investigate and develop solutions for the supply chain financing ecosystem. StanChart was the first worldwide bank to invest in Linklogis.
Prior to this, the bank collaborated with fintech pioneers located in China, such as Ant Group, which owns Alipay and whose Antchain-based global trading platform Trusple has been used by companies such as StanChart, Citi, DBS Bank, and Deutsche Bank, among others.
Olea is intended to assist StanChart in raising its profile in the global digital trade finance market, and the bank’s decision to develop a blockchain infrastructure is a continuation of the bank’s ongoing engagement with blockchain technology.
Other global banks that have embraced blockchain technology for trade financing especially include HSBC, BNP Paribas, and Citi, whose joint platform is set to be live in Singapore in the second quarter of 2020, according to the Financial Times.
StanChart has already engaged with several of these same institutions on the use of blockchain for trade finance, as seen by the eTrade Connect blockchain trade finance platform, which was launched in Hong Kong in 2018 and is now available worldwide.
As part of its first live operations in 2017, the digital trade finance platform we.trade, which has a number of prominent founding banks among its ranks (including HSBC and Rabobank), collaborated with the IBM blockchain powered by the Hyperledger Fabric to complete its first live operations on the IBM blockchain powered by the Hyperledger Fabric.
