Bitcoin Forum

Hello all,

I write my final dissertation on the blockchain technology. My subject is " What are the blockchain's effects on the financial intermediation ? "

I must admit that I have no idea how can I begin this work. So could you help me to think a plan/ table of contents in order to know the direction where I have to go...

In advance, thank you for your help!

Tibs

How familiar are you with blockchains and cryptocurrencies to begin with?

The structure of your dissertation will largely depend on your perspective on the matter (ie. technological, economical, sociological, etc.) so that's hard to tell without additional information.

Either way, if finance is involved the European Central Bank may have some papers that could be of interest for you:
https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/scplps/ecb.lwp16.en.pdf?344b9327fec917bd7a8fd70864a94f6e
https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/scpops/ecbop172.en.pdf
https://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/other/ecb.stella_project_report_september_2017.pdf
https://www.ecb.europa.eu/paym/intro/governance/shared/pdf/201709_dlt_impact_on_harmonisation_and_integration.pdf

I personally only read the third one, but the others may have some interesting insights as well.

I am just a beginner about the blockchain but it seems to me a very interresting subject currently. I do my study in business management, more precisely in banking and asset management. So I would like to write about the financial and economic impacts of the blockchain on the financial intermediation.

Thank you for the papers, I will take a look.

In that case I'd also recommend the following article for a bit of context on the challenges of distributed, trustless accounting and the problems that cryptocurrencies are trying to solve:

https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3136559

In my opinion it's very important to understand what cryptocurrencies are trying to achieve in the first place, before throwing yourself headfirst into the matter.


As far as your structure is concerned, some starting points to consider:

a) Current impact and future implications

b) Token economy and the rise of decentralized crowdfunding

c) Non-governmental currency issuance and the resulting free market of competing monies

d) Smart contracts and digital ownership

e) Viability of private blockchains

f) Current practical role of cryptocurrencies in international remittance

g) Immutability of financial transactions on public blockchains

h) Permissionless transactions as means to circumvent financial censorship

I was thinking about the jargon "leading zeros" in contrast to "add padding zeros" 

Perfect, I will read the article.

It seems that the different points that you give me are very interesting.

I will search a couple of information about this and I come back soon.

Thank you a lot!

You may well have already done this, but I recommend reading and using references from Satoshi's 2007 nine page paper. That was the paper that laid out the concepts of blockchain (as used with bitcoin), and by no means is it obsolete.