From Crypto to Web3: The Decentralisation of Financial Services
🌟 Diana Biggs is on a mission to explore the future of finance and technology. She worked for HSBC as their first Global Head of Innovation, and is currently a Board Member of the World Economic Forum’s Digital Leaders of Europe Community and an Associate Fellow of the Said Business School at University of Oxford.
💸 Today, we tap into Diana’s expertise and passion for blockchain technology and the digitalisation of financial services.
1️⃣ Cryptocurrencies have a wider impact beyond potentially bringing returns – they are often seen as a game-changer for the financial industry, and Diana tells us why this attracted her to the space.
2️⃣ Diana discusses why it’s important to have optimism for the future and for building completely new systems, and the impact these new systems may have on us as consumers.
3️⃣ As things continue to change, and an increasing number of people want to learn about Web3, Diana tells us why it’s an exciting opportunity, but also why it’s important to stay grounded and see the bigger picture.
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1. the appeal of the crypto world
“Decentralisation might seem like an idea that seems crazy, but if you look more closely at what is happening within our economic systems, you realise it is a possibility. ”
Diana started using the Internet in the early 90’s — when you could access it through something called Freenet. She was involved in the Cyberpunk movement and going to meet ups in the early 90s for the hacker quarterly.
Watching the emergence of the web and having the ability to communicate with people over the Internet got her interested in this idea. What especially attracted Diana was the exchange of information.
After her MBA, Diana was led into the financial services. In 2008, the entire industry was in a crisis and Diana felt like she joined the world of finance just as it was starting to fall apart.
Diana went onto work on the ground with Kiva, a San Francisco based startup, that is enabling people to provide microfinance loans over the internet with a high repayment rate of around 99%.
In 2013, Diana came across Bitcoin through her brother. The appeal for Diana was more about the possibilities of this new form of money possible that is inherently global and digital, rather than the potential returns it could bring.
2. building new systems
It seemed like cryptocurrencies could be a system that works well with the world that Diana envisioned, which was always one that was about being a global citizen and having a digitally focused life.
Having travelled to over 90 countries, having to constantly figure out how to open new bank accounts and move money around, Diana saw a big opportunity there. With the world getting more globally and internationally connected in terms of commerce and the way people live their lives - there was the trend that made crypto interesting in terms of concept and the potential opportunities.
Bitcoin's inception happened in 2008 and there was a group of people that were looking at creating a new form of electronic cash that operated out of the system. The technology was never ready to allow for a system that actually didn't have a central intermediary.
The financial crisis of 2008 also showed that there was a lot more awareness around potential corruption in centralised financial systems.
Instead of a centralised system that is more prone to corruption, it is better to move to one that is essentially trustless, moving away from trusted third parties that are corrupt to varying levels. Simply to have that sort of freedom and a new way of setting things up is a really key point when we're looking at crypto and web3: you need to have an optimism for the future.
It all depends on how you build it, but that perspective of building something completely new, creating new systems is entirely possible. Having seen how the Internet came out from something that hardly anyone used into something so commonplace only showed Diana that new systems are absolutely possible to build.
Of course, there are complexities that come with building new systems, because of the nature of the legacy systems, the complexity of data privacy issues and around financial regulation, and how that differs across different jurisdictions.
3. the bigger picture
Web3 is about the use of blockchain technology in order to create new systems in which data is really owned and controlled by individuals, and where they are able to benefit from it.
Individuals are able to benefit because of the types of economic models and systems, and the way that organisations work within this new framework, is one that allows for each individual to get the economic benefits which would previously come from the controlling third party corporations.
Banks used to be the institutions that were controlling our societies that had the biggest market caps — they were the big organisations that people wanted to work for. Now, this has shifted to technology.
However, we have seen an increasing number of data breaches, regulation, GDPR and increasing concerns about controls over technology. This is why blockchain is appealing: it allows individuals to be owning their data and then actually benefiting from the use of that data for other parties and for other use cases. This is a technology system that allows for traceability as well as for individuals to have wallets and for there to be a tokenization that would allow for the repayment of that.
We're dealing with some very long-term, social and economic governance types of changes and shifts that are very much more long term - which means it can be very difficult to find a way or to know how to respond to today.
While it is really exciting that there's such an influx of talent and investment into these new decentralized systems, it is important to be mindful of the future and see the bigger picture: stay grounded and remember why we wanted to build things in these new ways, and be mindful of the sorts of projects and investments that are helping us move towards those goals.
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You can follow and connect with Diana at:
Twitter: @DianacBiggs
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