American soybean was sold to China using blockchain

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Louis Dreyfus Co, Shandong Bohi Industry Co, ING, Societe Generale and ABN Amro took part in the trade where the sales contract, letter of credit and certificates were digitized on the Easy Trading Connect platform (ETC).

The global head of trade operations at Louis Dreyfus noted that the time spent processing documents and data had been reduced by five times.

Blockchain, which first appeared as a system that supports cryptocurrency bitcoin, is a distributed transaction record that is supported by a network of computers on the Internet. Blockchain technology has been successfully used for trading in other markets, such as oil.

The deal included the participation of users on the platform based on blockchain by teams of Louis Dreyfus Company as a seller and Bohi as a buyer, issuing banks and confirming the letter of credit.

Russell Marine Group and Blue Water Shipping also participated in this process, issuing all the necessary certificates. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) provided information on how to include phyto-sanitary certificates in this process.

Advantages include cost savings and greater speed. Financial institutions have been investing large amounts around the world to test whether technology can be used to simplify transactions in many different markets.