It is no secret that post-Brexit, Paris is looking to position itself as a new financial capital of the EU. And so the French government has already came with a number of plans to appease to bankers looking to move across the English Channel in order to keep access to the common (big) market.
As part of that plan, Macron & Co. want to make France fintech-friendly, and yes – that includes blockchain. So here’s what they came up with so far…
Paris approves blockchain trading of unlisted securities
According to a recent Reuters report, the French government has given the official nod for trading of unlisted securities using blockchain.
These new rules will enable banks and fintech firms to trade the assets without relying on middlemen and theoretically at near-instant speeds.
“The use of this new technology will allow fintech firms and other financial actors to develop new ways of trading securities that are faster, cheaper, more transparent and safer,” Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said in a statement.
He went on to add that the new rules would be “another asset for Paris’ attractiveness as a financial center” as the sector seeks to put itself on the fintech map, where London currently looms large.
French government has a working group focused on blockchain
Spearheaded by France Stratégie, which acts as a kind of research and strategy development office on socioeconomic issues and reports to the Prime Minister, the working group aims to:
- Research the blockchain implementations that exist today
- Explore the benefits (and costs) of public-sector applications
- Propose how the French government can “support its development”.
The working group will draw members from both government agencies and startups working with the tech. Specific agencies include France’s Prudential Supervisory and Resolution Authority and DINSIC, an information technology office that reports to the Prime Minister.
And again, we tend to think whatever findings and conclusions this working group comes to, they will be used to make Paris the premier financial hub of Europe.
Major institutions are on board…
But we have yet to see any results from all of their announcements.
Among those working on blockchain-related projects are major banks like BNP Paribas and Société Générale, major insurer AXA, national railroad company SNCF, major retailer Carrefour and energy giant Total; while the French central bank has been working on an interbank proof-of-concept, and has launched a Lab for blockchain startups last February.
In addition, the French public financial institution, La Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations, has launched a workgroup called LabChain to test out the technology with major financial corporations and blockchain startups.
And so are startups…
When it comes to blockchain startups, France is not Switzerland — which is doing a remarkable job in attracting the so called “crypto innovation” — but it does have a few players in the space.
One of them is Blockchain Partner, which has already worked on a few pilots with major banks. Another one is Ledger that is best known for its hardware wallets.
Also, there is Stratumn, which offers a platform for developing enterprise-level blockchain applications; Acinq, a pioneer of Lightning Network implementations; and iEx.ec, which is focused on distributed computing for decentralized applications (dapps), as well as a few others like Ledgys, Woleet and so on.
And organizations…
There are a few organizations in France promoting blockchain technologies, the biggest of which is Chaintech that counts more than 120 members, including around 20 startups.
Chaintech aims at “promoting visibility and synergy of French speaking blockchain actors, and give them a common institutional voice”. As part of that goal, it organizes and participates in meetings, conferences and hackathons.
In addition, there are Le Cercle du Coin (historically more focused on bitcoin) and Asseth (focused on Ethereum). Less formal is the CryptoFR community, organized around a forum and a Slack group with more than 1500 people.
The endgame is to become the next London
Many developed countries are investing in blockchain-related technologies, but in case of France – that could be an add-on to the bigger thing, to make sure Paris emerges as the new financial hub of Europe.
Paris is by no means the only contender for that spot — Amsterdam and Frankfurt are both interested as well — but the fact that bankers can get a comparable lifestyle in Paris as they had in London could be the key here.
Also, a fintech-friendly environment could prove an important piece of the puzzle. And the same goes for the thriving blockchain community…