London-based startup Setl has claimed a milestone by breaking through the 1 billion transactions-per-day barriers for blockchain movements during testing, reports the Financial Times. 

The breakthrough will inevitably lead to institutions in the financial services industry to further look at blockchain as a viable, large-scale model to process transactions every day. 

Blockchain platform and UK start-up Setl, founded by a group of executives and hedge fund investors this year had also previously announced plans to deploy a payment and settlements infrastructure with over 40 financial institutions including banks, based on blockchain technology.  The infrastructure will cover multiple currencies and will be multi-asset, in an attempt to create a cross-industry solution. 

Setl operates through a network of distributed ledgers to help settle transactions in real-time. 

Peter Randall, COO of Setl said:

Our processing capacity now exceeds the volume of every electronic payment made globally on a live-time gross basis.  In collaboration with our partners, we know that we have a significant project ahead of us; today is a milestone in this process of bringing a scalable blockchain solution to the world of payments and settlement. 

A Time for Blockchain in the Financial Industry

The claim of the breakthrough comes during a time when the world’s biggest banks are actively looking at ways to save billions of dollars a year through reliable, decentralized networks that help with transactions that are faster, more efficient, and transparent. 

According to a report by Oliver Wyman, the costs incurred by the financial industry for clearing and settling of transactions by conventional means costs banks and institutions between $65 and $80 billion a year. 

Legacy blockchains, unlike Setl are not designed for financial markets and large volumes of transactions.  The World Payments Report, 2014 counted a total of 389 billion non-cash payments globally.  This includes wholesale and retail electronic payments to the tune of 1.06 billion movements per day.  The top 10 markets have, between them, approximately 300 billion payments a year or 800 million every day. 

Setl uses a network of nodes across Europe that makes a network of interlinked blockchains.  Initial plans include due-diligence for all participating users before enabling them to move assets from one chain to another using a “witness” node that is visible on both the sending and receiving chains. 

With the claim, Randall adds that the Setl blockchain was the first of its kind to prove that blockchain technology has the capability to handle large volumes of transactions. 

Image from Shutterstock.