Oil Majors, Banks Partner To Launch Blockchain-powered Oil Trading Platform

[PRIBO247]

VAKT, a company formed by an energy
consortium, launched its blockchain-powered
post-trade processing and management
platform for commodities. The launch , now in
physically traded BFOET crude oil contracts, will
be extended later to all physically traded energy
commodities.

VAKT is an independent company created and
backed by nine leading energy companies,
commodity traders and banks - BP, Equinor,
Shell, Gunvor, Mercuria, Koch Supply & Trading,
ABN Amro, ING and Societe Generale.

The platform was created by VAKT in
partnership with global software consultancy
ThoughtWorks and supported by JPMorgan's
Quorum private distributed ledger.

The platform eliminates the age-old problems in
reconciliation and paper-based processes by
managing physical energy transactions from
trade entry to final settlement on blockchain to
transform the full trade lifecycle. Trade finance
will also be fully digitalized with an integrated
banking marketplace.

BP, Equinor, Shell, Gunvor and Mercuria are
participants in the initial launch as the
platform's first users. They will run the
blockchain platform in parallel with their internal
systems. The platform is set to open to the
wider market in January 2019.

The blockchain platform is expected to provide
30 to 40 percent efficiency and trade finance
savings through improved speed and security,
which benefits everyone along the supply chain
from market participants to customers.
In September, a consortium of fifteen of the
world's largest banks, trading companies, an
energy major, and an inspection company set
out to develop a similar decentralized Ethereum
blockchain-powered commodity trading platform
in partnership with ConsenSys. It is expected to
catalyze the world's commodity trade finance
network.

The new joint venture called "komgo SA" will be
managed and operated as an independent entity.
The fifteen investors in the venture include ABN
Amro, BNP Paribas, Citibank, Crédit Agricole
CIB, Gunvor, ING, Koch, Macquarie, Mercuria,
MUFG Bank, Natixis, Rabobank, Shell, SGS and
Societe Generale.

Source : http://www.rttnews.com