Major financial companies such as JP Morgan and HSBC are accelerating their blockchain-related activities a few months ahead of 2024 and increasing the use of distributed ledger technology (DLT) in the traditional financial sector.

There was an increase in activity among major financial institutions such as JP Morgan and HSBC in November. On November 3, JP Morgan executed the first decentralized finance (DeFi) transaction on a public blockchain. The company launched programmable payments for its enterprise blockchain platform JPM Coin on November 10. JP Morgan Chase and Apollo executives also announced plans for a tokenized enterprise mainnet on November 28.

Besides JP Morgan, Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) is also on the move. On November 1, HSBC and financial services provider Ant Group tested tokenized deposits in a sandbox regulated by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. Additionally, on November 8, HSBC partnered with Metaco, a technology company owned by Ripple, to hold tokenized securities on its new custody platform.

Interest from major financial companies shows that DLT's potential is slowly leaving previous skepticism around it behind. Franklin Templeton executive Sandy Kaul, quoted in the Bloomberg report, said that "technology adoption is actually accelerating very quickly." Kaul stated that the path to restructuring global financial markets can be seen for the first time.

Franklin Templeton is one of many asset managers vying for a Bitcoin ETF. The company filed for a spot Bitcoin ETF with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on September 12.

Besides those who are taking big steps into blockchain, some prefer to stay small and move towards it. MoneyGram CEO Alex Holmes said in an interview with Bloomberg that the company only has about 20 employees dedicated full-time to its blockchain efforts. "It's commensurate with some revenue and profit expectations," he said.