The following is a summary of our recent interview with Caitlin Long, which can be accessed on our site here or on iTunes here.
Many of us are familiar with the rise of Bitcoin and digital cryptocurrencies, but few realize how powerful the underlying technology of these digital assets may prove to be.
This time on FS Insider, we spoke with Caitlin Long, Chairman and President of Symbiont, on how blockchain, distributed ledger technology has the power to topple entire monopolies, particularly the financial industry.
Changes Are Coming
While Long was working for Morgan Stanley, she took a keen interest in Bitcoin and the technology that runs it: the blockchain.
Within several years, various blockchain-based companies began popping up, automating a number of different services, and she immediately saw the handwriting on the wall.
Blockchain technology enables “radical automation of business processes today that are very slow and manual and involved,” she said.
Here's a short clip of where she explains how this works:
Central Banks Testing Blockchain Tech
Long believes the next step is for central banks to get involved.
“Blockchain applications of this technology — what some would call Bitcoin 2.0 — are good interim steps to what will ultimately be a decentralized (monetary system) that we end up moving to,” she said.
Twenty years from now, we may not have nationalized money like we do today, she added.
Once one of the major central banks “offers its currency on a distributed ledger … what will happen is, all the users in foreign payments … will take their foreign exchange to that one central bank,” Long said.
This could radically change the flow of payments and completely rearrange how the monetary system works. People understand that, which is why the blockchain is getting a lot of hype, Caitlin pointed out. But “it’s not hype,” she insisted. “It is very real.” The only thing in question now is the timing.
Click here to listen to this full interview with Catlin Long: Blockchain Technology Has Power to Destroy Monopolies
