Forbes on Oct. 24 published an interview conducted by two reporters with Daniel Masters, former global head of energy trading at JP Morgan and now a go-to “pioneer” of block-chain and digital currencies for “traditional” bankers and central bankers. He is now CEO of Coinshares, Inc. It is clear from the interview that, from the standpoint of digital currency traders and planners like Masters, “traditional” banking means investment banking, and emphatically not commercial banking, which is going to cease to exist in his near-future view.
“The most interesting aspect of CBDCs [central bank digital currencies] is the impact they will have on commercial banks and the financial system as a whole,” said Masters. “Today, central banks issue currency to a slew of commercial banks like Chase and Bank of America. These banks do two things—create products and services such as mortgages, and deal with the end users. I think we are going into a new paradigm where central banks issue CBDCs, commercial banks cease to exist, and the service layer is filled by crazy new emerging companies like Compound Finance, Uniswap, SushiSwap, and people that are really getting distributed, decentralized finance done today.”
