Barclays, Goldman Champion ISDA Standard for Blockchain Derivatives

Now, the financial world's blockchain evangelists are pinning their hopes on a broader industry effort to harmonize the way data is presented and reported, regardless of the platform used.

Known as the common domain model, it was proposed by the International Swaps and Derivatives Association in May of last year and has the support of blockchain tech startups such as R3 and Axoni.

Perhaps the biggest champion of CDM as the key to making blockchain a reality in the derivatives space is Barclays.

Stepping back, Barclays has played a central role in the convergence of DLT, smart contracts and common data standards.

"What we ultimately need in the derivatives space is multiple market infrastructures, including multiple clearing houses, adopting a common standard for data formats, reference data, transactional data, and business processes."

Goldman Sachs is also a supporter, and sees the common data standard, when combined with shared ledgers, as a way to alleviate some of the pressure created by the increased reporting requirements under regulations like the European Union's MiFID 2.

The investment bank won't rule out alternatives to blockchain in adopting the standard, however.

Less equivocal than Goldman, Barclays is making a forceful case for using DLT in conjunction with the common standard.

Braine also pointed out a way that a common data standard could amplify another benefit of blockchain.

A commonly pitched use case for the tech is the streamlining of regulatory reporting - the regulator can operate a node on the blockchain and pull data directly from it.