The banking in the era of distributed ledgers

Distributed ledger technology (DLT) refers to a decentralised and distributed digital system for recording and verifying transactions where multiple parties have access to the same database and can validate transactions without the need for intermediaries. A network of nodes maintains and updates the database, and transactions are secured through cryptography. The conceptualisation of DLT can be traced back to the 1990s, but the first practical application of DLT was the creation of Bitcoin in 2009. Since then, DLT has evolved and expanded and is now being used in a wide range of industries. Among other sectors, the financial system as a whole, and banking in particular, have started to apply DLT to improve financial transactions and processes and to offer new products and services to their customers.