The Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE) announced that cryptocurrencies will soon be offered as trading assets for their clients by the end of 2018.
According to JSE, they have signed an agreement with Blockstation, a blockchain startup, to create new digital assets on the trade platform. Although they have not disclosed which type of tokens will be listed yet, the platform will be good to go live before the year ends.
Marlene Street Forrest, managing director or JSE said that this move to offer cryptocurrencies as trade assets could fit in with the other investment products such as equities and bonds.
In an interview by CoinDesk, Forrest said:
“The end game at the end of the day is to trade tokens, the end game is smart contracts, the end game is to provide that area of the market that would like this product, to start to do so in a secure manner.”
The technology will be provided by Blockstation as JSE’s infrastructure will be integrated to the new platform. This will allow investors to purchase or trade cryptocurrencies.
Other than listing cryptos for trading, JSE is also want to find out how the Distributed Ledger Technology or blockchain will benefit both the platform and their clients, Street Forrest said. She hinted JSE’s plan to issue their own cryptocurrencies in the future.
“The environment changes, the entire ecosystem changes, so at that point in time that might be the case, [although] at this point in time that is not a discussion,” she said.
Jai Waterman, co-founder and chief enterprise architect said that they have been working on the JSE project for almost six months, according to CoinDesk. Their aim is to develop the platform’s custom version to be used for the exchange which includes tools for tracking market manipulation and other compliances.
“Our mission is to provide … a secure method of trading cryptocurrencies with broker-dealers and stock exchanges,” he said. “We’re providing the stock exchange the technology for a broker-dealer network and depository, so that from end-to-end, their life cycle of trading – just like with securities – they can do the exact same thing with blockchain and cryptocurrencies.”
According to Street Forrest, the JSE is not in a rush and takes its time to guarantee that this development is safe for their investors
“We have a steering committee that was designed and formulated to look at the Blockstation product, to look at the blockchain technology in general and to go through the phases to ensure that we understand what we are getting involved with and are also trained in what this entire trading of cryptocurrency involves,” she said.
Therefore, as what Street Forrest explained the integration of blockchain would be “gradual.”
