
Blockchain-Based Gold Settlement Is Coming to London - dustinmoris
https://news.bitcoin.com/blockchain-based-gold-settlement-london/
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brighton36
Why is this interesting? What is the net efficiency being achieved here? Will
this gold be cheaper due to reduced settlement costs, or is blockchain just
the buzzword du jour that increases your VC funding.

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jgalt212
From my dabblings the in the fintech space, it certainly seems that if you're
trying to sell a ledger a service these days and you don't use Blockchain, you
will not get funding and/or any press mentions.

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kitsune_
Does this company have any 'official' relation to Paxos, the consensus
protocol? This sounds like an incredibly unfortunate and potentially
misleading name.

Addendum: I'm by no means an expert on this subject, but are't all those
fintech startups that dabble in 'permissioned block chains' and 'distributed
ledgers' without incorporating bitcoin's proof of work / public p2p nature
effectively just selling rebranded distributed databases? In that light the
name Paxos would be even more comical.

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kanzure
> Does this company have any 'official' relation to Paxos, the consensus
> protocol? This sounds like an incredibly unfortunate and potentially
> misleading name.

"Then they join the proud list of all the other poorly named companies in the
bitcoin ecosystem including the likes of coinbase, blockchain, consensys,
chain, decentral, 21, asicminer, ledger, bitcoin.com, and elliptic." \- some
other comment, i don't remember the source

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anaolykarpov
It means that I'll be able to buy gold just like I'm able to buy bitcoin? and
instead of physically storing gold I'll have the tokens and will be able to
get physical gold for them whenever I want?

Does this means that the demand for gold (and implicitly its price) will soon
increase?

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cloakandswagger
This concept of notional gold that can be redeemed for physical bullion has
existed for a while (see: Xetra-Gold). Adding a blockchain for tracking
redemptions doesn't fundamentally change the service.

And just like companies like Xetra-Gold, it doesn't address the chiefmost
concern: You have no assurance that your fund actually has the gold they claim
they do. They might be "renting" the physical bullion out and running a
fractional reserve system, in essence a giant Ponzi scheme.

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alexfisher
Digix is another interesting blockchain/gold project being built on Ethereum:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWbgMoJVIzk&feature=share](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWbgMoJVIzk&feature=share)

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lightedman
So, moving from fiat crypto to gold standard crypto?

I love how everything eventually comes full circle.

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CyberDildonics
How does this comment make any sense at all? Bitcoin etc. aren't fiat
settlement systems, they are currencies that have active exchanges.

Using a blockchain for a settlement would mean a ledger of keys that should
match 1:1 with the gold held by a company.

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lightedman
"Using a blockchain for a settlement would mean a ledger of keys that should
match 1:1 with the gold held by a company"

If I were to open up a mine and dump several tons of gold on the market, your
1:1 bitcoin value disappears entirely. I think you should check out why we
moved away from a gold standard in the first place - it was too subject to
supply pressures.

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CyberDildonics
Once again, you are confusing a floating currency with a company using a
blockchain technique for more transparent and safe book keeping of their gold
inventory.

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lightedman
"Once again, you are confusing a floating currency with a company using a
blockchain technique for more transparent and safe book keeping of their gold
inventory."

You're purposely ignoring basic economic principles required to understand the
gist of my comment. Spend some time doing day trading in the metals market and
you'll see how a blockchain isn't going to help with keeping gold inventory
straight when the prices are tied up. This is gold settlement, not simple
inventory tracking, so this is a much more complex issue than you're trying to
make it out to be.

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cheiVia0
Failing startup trying to pivot?

[http://www.coindesk.com/itbit-exodus-populating-startups-
blo...](http://www.coindesk.com/itbit-exodus-populating-startups-blockchain-
expertise/)

