JP Morgan has initiated a big massive boost to its global transactions business by introducing seven top Indian lenders like Axis Bank and ICICI Bank to its blockchain platform network which allows payment transactions to reach the beneficiaries quick with lesser steps in international payments.

The platform, entitled as IIN (Interbank Information Network) is the first live blockchain service launched by JP Morgan and represents a lot of banks to join the live application of blockchain technology. 

Six of the Indian banks comprise of Yes Bank, Federal Bank of India, Canara Bank, Union Bank of India, Axis Bank, and ICICI Bank.

“We are encouraged by the huge interest from the seven major banks in India to join our IIN initiative,” said the CEO of JPM Chase Bank India, Madhav Kalyan. “As we look to address the challenges banks face in cross-border payments pertaining to friction points caused by multiple hops through the payment chain when further information is required.”

The INN intends to provide protected exchange information to financial institutes that are involved in international payment transactions. 

“With IIN, the time taken to resolve these inquiries can be reduced from up to 16 days to mere hours,” said Kalyan.

Banks often seek data from other banks for making decisions before they execute international payments. 

Such kind of information includes beneficiary name, date of birth, and address. These inquiries traditionally take 2-16 days to complete, which causes significant delays in payments. 

INN’s aim

The INN platform started last year, received a fillip this year in India with a number of banks joining the network. The primary application on IIN is for the infrastructure for banks, allowing them to exchange information related to AML inquiries and compliance sanctions. 

The bank stated that IIN’s aim is to get rid of all the unnecessary delay points in international payments and develop new models, products and services over three years. 

The bank’s vision is to grow IIN with more participants and develop services that focus on enabling payments fast, with transparency and cost efficiency. 

Over 330 banks in the world, including the Australia and New Zealand Banking Group, Deutsche Bank have joined the IIN. 

“The intent with IIN was always to develop a meaningful ecosystem of bank users, all focused on harnessing emerging technologies such as blockchain to better address the complex cross border payments industry,” said the Global Head of Clearing for JPM Chase Bank, John Hunter, in a press release last week. 

About JP Morgan

It is a global investment and corporate bank with $25 trillion of assets under its custody and has $458 billion in deposits.