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The Crypto Industry Intent to Decentralise Financial Services While fintech startups challenge the banks and deliver new innovation to the sector, blockchain companies fundamentally change the rules of the game with ’Decentralised Finance.’ By: Sebastian Kjær
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here is no denying that banks and fintech companies have made our daily lives easier and our lifestyles more affordable, thanks to thoughtful innovations. Even so, Rune Christensen – the founder of the blockchain project MakerDAO – suggests that more significant changes will emerge following the adoption of decentralised finance (DeFi): “Neobanks have repackaged the traditional banking infrastructure, which had existed for over 80 years. This has been great for consumers and brought innovation to the industry. Yet, there is a limitation on innovation when solely focusing on the packaging. Instead of starting with the packaging, we start by building the inner parts from scratch using blockchain,” he says. MakerDAO is one of the first DeFi-projects based on blockchain. The project aims to create the same financial products we know – such as transfers, loans, and savings. The difference lies in the infrastructure.
A stable currency and interest rate Alongside an army of similar blockchain projects, MakerDAO is creating an open, worldwide infrastructure for financial services, free of intermediaries. Their first major contribution to the DeFi-movement was the cryptocurrency, Dai – a ‘stablecoin’ whose value is equivalent to one US dollar. The price holds thanks to underlying assets from cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, as well as the United States dollar. The system is controlled by digital, programmable contracts, which are handled by the decentralised blockchain.
Rune Christensen Founder of MakerDAO
