A Closer Look at Block Chain Technology

As a manager, I anticipate that we are going to be served by our block chain technology service providers and realize that a certain amount of experimentation needs to be performed within our organization, in order to get comfortable with its usage. We will be customers to this service because at the end of the day, business at Eaton Vance is comprised of asset management. Even though there is an ample amount of technology enablement to the asset management business, as an organization, we would much rather buy than build this technology from our service providers.

Use Cases wherein Block Chain Impacts the Organization

Block chain is a great ledger for post-trade settlement, but I believe there are some use cases where its utilization is not as effective. Consider pre-trade; block chain does not appear to be a vehicle for legitimate raw trading. In fact, there are trading platforms and technologies with the inclusion of varying algorithmic trading capabilities in the market already. In these specific cases, I don’t see how block chain would be an effective solution for real-time transactional systems. This ledger is suitable for post-trade use cases. For instance, consider bank loan settlements. Unlike trading and equity, the time for a bank loan to settle is variable. Utilizing a technology such as block chain could reduce the settlement cycle by a large factor, or at the least provide certainty that can help asset managers to reduce potential settlement risks.

Some Insights on Personal Technological Acumen

As an ex-Navy Nuclear Submarine Officer, one of the foundations of Navy Nuclear power was training. Talking about jobs in technology, one of the great things is that there is no constant. It is always evolving; becoming better. Even so, training—both informally and collaboratively—is a continual process. At Eaton Vance, we believe in experimenting with emerging technologies and spending quality time to find solutions that will provide immediate business value. Hence, training is a vital part of our organization. For example, we incorporate the Information Technology Infrastructure Library, which helps align our core technology and infrastructure with the business. So all trainees get ITIL v3 certified, just to ensure that all employees are on the same page with regard to fundamental principles. Another example—which is specific to developers– would be agile certification.

The Future of Block chain

Block chain definitely has some attractive upcoming traits. Considering it is a regular ledger system, the information is most likely stored in databases, which is stored in one place, for the most part. The most important attribute of the block chain technology is that it extends a distributed platform, which means high availability, easy accessibility, and no single point of failure. Additionally, access to the record of history of transactions at all times that is secured with proper implementation makes it all the more convenient. These I believe, are some of the attributes that we as customers would hope to receive from this technology.