Is it still necessary to point out that blockchain technology was born out of a deep desire to get away from the excesses of our financial system?
This disruptive technology, embodied by Satoshi Nakamoto’s Bitcoin protocol, carries with it the alter-globalist DNA of its precursors. After the explosive financial crisis of 2008, the least one can say is that the lessons have not been learned by a financial industry that is once again gripped by an extraordinarily violent crisis.
After 2008, there should be a social awareness of this financial economy and a readjustment to the real economy. That was not the case, just the opposite.
12 years later, at the centre of the COVID 19 storm, blockchain and the entire digital asset industry must spearhead an evolution that has become salutary for both finance and, more broadly, for our conception of the economy. If tomorrow every company bears a social responsability equal to its fair economic weight, then the blockchain can be the propagating virus of this new redistribution (sharing economy).
Attraction, Fusion, Contamination
The asymetry between impact and corporate social responsability (CSR) is phenomenal in finance. It is not for pure cynicism but simply because it is an industry that was not designed to bear this responsibility. Finance, which will experience a considerable contraction, will have to reinvent itself to adapt to new challenges. Digital assets are the focus of all attention, and stablecoins’ recent enthusiasm by central banks is just one of many indicators of this.
For its part, the nascent digital asset industry is booming. It presents all the characteristics to embody this paradigm shift, taking the leadership of responsible finance and more broadly of the responsible industry:
- a DNA free from the dogmas of finance
- a neo-industry free to integrate virtuous practices
- a technology that brings transparency
- IT protocols (Smart Contract) likely to become tools at the service of this ambition (Social Smart Contract)
This is also the analysis made by Simon Polrot, president of ADAN, who believes that “blockchain and digital assets will revolutionize the balance of creation and exchange of values” and that, “in a context where the vision social economy responds to a strong demand from the general public, digital assets have a key role to play in helping to make finance more ethical and responsible”.
Everything suggests that the crisis we are going through will accelerate the assimilation by finance of a significant part of this new digital asset industry. An assimilation that will take with it the DNA of the actors who compose it and by contamination propagate it within it.
Like the viral process, the stronger the assimilation by finance of this industry (viral load), the more the intrinsic characteristics of this technology (convey) and the vision of the leaders of this industry (genome) will fully play their roles to change the economic paradigm.
This is a rare opportunity for all these startups to sustainably and positively change finance and mechanically impact the rest of the economy by capillarity.
Lepetit Jeremi — Retreeb’s Co-Founder
Translated from French into English by Julie Lenfant
