A couple of years back, CEO of JP Morgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, called Bitcoin a “fraud”, months later he said that he regretted the comment, but still, then, he was not interested in Bitcoin. But today his bank is about to launch its own. His uneven views on bitcoin didn’t resist his corporation from going ahead and launching a new digital token JPM Coin. Bank said its digital currency is based on blockchain technology and is intended to enable the instantaneous transactions of money between institutional accounts. JP Morgan said that each JPM Coin will have the valuation equivalent to one US dollar which will not fluctuate. When one client transacts over blockchain, JPM Coins are transferred and instantaneously redeemed for the equivalent amount of US Dollars, which will optimize and reduce the typical settlement time. Bank further added that “JPM Coin will be extended to other major cryptocurrencies, it is currently a prototype, and as it moves toward production the firm will actively engage our regulators to explain its design and solicit their feedback and any necessary approvals. We have always believed in the potential of blockchain technology and we are supportive of cryptocurrencies as long as they are properly controlled and regulated.” JPM Coin will be issued on the bank’s own private blockchain, called Quorum. The computers that validate new transactions must have permission to be part of the network. J.P Morgan is betting that its first-mover status and large market share in corporate payments, it banks 80 percent of the companies in the Fortune 500, which will give its technology a good chance of getting adopted, even if other banks create their own coin. JP Morgan stands transactions through cryptocurrency could be used in place of wire transfers that generally take several days to complete, it is believed that in future big companies like Facebook could move money around quickly just by shifting around JPM coin. It is not like JP Morgan is investing the first time in crypto and blockchain but, it has already built an Etherium based blockchain platform one year back for business customers and using its digital tokens backed by gold bars and diamonds on the platform. Question is, how much will it influence the future of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology? Well, it will be too early to say anything, though potentially very effective, it is just a prototype and scheduled trial. So let’s wait and watch how much it gets implemented in the real world
