Binangonan Rural Bank strikes deal to implement blockchain, powered by Cloudchain Philippines

September 7, 2022

Binangonan Rural Bank closes deal to implement Cloudchain blockchain provided by First Shoshin Holdings Corporation (FSHC), becoming first rural bank in the country to adopt the digital ledger technology for its financial products.

Headquartered out of Binangonan, Rizal, Binangonan Rural Bank (BRB) was the first rural bank in the Philippines to be issued an electronic money issuance (EMI) license by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

In October 2022, Binangonan Rural Bank achieved another major milestone among rural banks across the Philippines: BRB will be the first to implement blockchain in its suite of financial products. The bank will be using Cloudchain, a blockchain powered by a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) registered in the state of Wyoming, United States.

Binangonan Rural Bank’s implementation of Cloudchain comes courtesy of First Shoshin, a holdings corporation that specializes in leading edge technologies, including blockchain. Liezl Pecson, a representative from Cloudchain Philippines and one of the foremost experts on web3 in the nation, will take lead on the development.

“By becoming the first rural bank to adopt blockchain, Binangonan Rural Bank consumer and enterprise customers will also experience a major first: They’ll be among the first customers in the Philippines to experience the unrivaled efficiency, transparency, and security that blockchain can bring to financial and banking products,” said Jack Ponce-Enrile, Chairman of FSHC.

While Binangonan Rural Bank was not able to discuss specifics around the implementation, owing to regulatory policies around product and feature disclosures, the BRB team provided an overview of how blockchain can help their customers across the three pillars of security, efficiency, and transparency.

For security, the team cited recent data breaches that caused customers to lose funds. Such would not occur in a blockchain-powered system, which is resistant to intrusions because it’s a digital public ledger. Similar value applies to efficiency, given that many Filipinos still have to contend with long confirmation times for their digital transactions. Cloudchain validates transactions on a near instantaneous basis, providing an unrivaled user experience for any product built atop it.

Finally, the BRB team pointed to the benefit of transparency. When transacting over-the-air, many Filipinos are left in the dark on the status of their transactions. Cloudchain turns this guesswork into a relic of the past through an always-on explorer that users can check at any given time, eliminating any stress that previously came with making digital transactions.

Kenneth Tan, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Binangonan Rural Bank, is proud to extend the benefits of Cloudchain’s blockchain to BRB’s banking network throughout the Philippines.

“This partnership with First Shoshin to implement Cloudchain is an amazing opportunity to use a leading-edge technology to help our Filipino customers. On the surface, not all of them will know that these financial products are now backed by the blockchain, but everyone will benefit all the same. These include everyone from farmers and tricycle drivers to bakers and school teachers,” said Tan.