Australia's Commonwealth Bank is partnering with think tank Coala to run a two-day blockchain workshop in Sydney.
The bank says the conference will bring together regulators, policy makers, technologists and media "to better understand the upcoming challenges and opportunities of blockchain technologies, and their impact on the current social, economic and political order".
CommBank has already conducted its own experiments with blockchain technology, working with US startup Ripple to transfer funds bank-to-bank across its subsidiaries.
Commonwealth Bank CIO David Whiteing says the Coala event offers an opportunity for Asia-Pacific regulators, government officials, academics and technologists to hear from some of the world’s leading blockchain academics and experts.
“The conference provides both entry-level education and in-depth discussions about the huge potential of distributed ledgers and the resulting economic, commercial, legal and social policy questions,” he says. “Blockchain has the potential to transform banking in the way that the internet transformed how we buy music and watch movies. It’s an exciting time in the development of this technology and our involvement means Commonwealth Bank is set to be at the forefront of this in Australia for the benefit of our customers."