Odaily Planet Daily News The cross-bank blockchain project trade linkage (eTradeConnect) launched by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority in 2018 will be closed at the end of August. The financing platform was originally designed to improve the efficiency of trade financing. The initial market response was satisfactory. It has also cooperated with the trade finance blockchain platform (Trade Finance Platform) launched by the Digital Currency Research Institute of the People's Bank of China on a trial basis, extending its use to cross-border trade financing. . But with the emergence of broader-purpose commercial data links and overlapping functions, the banking industry and regulators are reluctant to invest additional money in maintaining narrow-purpose trade linkage platforms. The platform will only operate until the end of this month, and banks have successively informed customers a few weeks ago that they will no longer provide trade linkage-related services. (Economic Journal)