MANAMA: Blockchain is likely to have the greatest impact on Islamic finance, NextBlock Global chief executive Alex Tapscott, the co-author of Blockchain Revolution and founding member of IMF’s high-level advisory group on fintech, told the 24th edition of the WIBC.

During his exclusive presentation on the blockchain revolution, Mr Tapscott said: “The technology likely to have the greatest impact on Islamic finance has arrived and it’s called the blockchain. The blockchain is the most important computer science innovation in at least a generation and represents nothing short of the second era of the Internet.”

“For 20 years we’ve had the Internet of information which has been a really powerful tool for changing how we communicate and how we share information, but it actually hasn’t had as big an impact on commerce or on finance as many people may have hoped, and that’s because the Internet is not a value medium, it’s an information medium,” he said.

Adding further, Mr Tapscott said: “Blockchain on the other hand represents the first native digital medium for value, and therefore represents a new Internet of value that promises to change basically every industry in the economy and transform the economic power grid and the old order of human affairs in very profound ways.”

“I personally am delighted to be speaking at the WIBC about the potential of blockchain because we’re at a very important inflection point for the industry. How incumbents react to this new innovation will basically dictate whether or not they will succeed or fail,” he noted.

“Should they choose to embrace it, to seek out new opportunities, and new markets, new products, and services, basically to do tomorrow what was impossible yesterday they will succeed, if they look to take this technology and apply it only to how they do business today, they will not succeed. And if they decide to shun it altogether they will likely fail,” said the expert.