According to a report by Chosun News, Woori Bank of South Korea has successfully tested overseas remittance via Ripple. The Digital Strategy Department, which is responsible for the test, expressed a positive attitude for introducing the technology in practice. As soon as possible, overseas remittances using the ripple solution will be commercialized this year.
The next step for the bank will now be to focus on practical training of its foreign exchange and IT departments in the use of the new system. A Woori bank official said: “The issue of overseas remittance fees is a matter for discussion, but it is much quicker and cheaper than existing remittances… In the future, the customer will choose the most advantageous overseas remittance method.”
Even with the introduction of overseas remittance technology using ripple solutions, it is unlikely to completely replace the current Swift network. Compared with the Swift network, which is spread all over the world, there are limited areas where ripple network is located.
A Japanese bank official said that the service will be adopted in Japan too: “Since the test results were good…Several banks, such as two or three megabanks and Internet professional banks, are pushing to introduce the practice.”
According to the SBI Group and Woori Bank, there are about 60 Japanese banks participating in the remittance test using this blockchain technology. Among them, 37 banks participated in the overseas remittance test that Woori Bank participated in. The Ripple network was well laid out in Japan, so Japanese banks were highly involved in the test. Non-Japanese banks included Woori Bank, Shinhan Bank and Siam Commercial Bank in Thailand.
When a domestic bank transfers money to a Japanese bank using Ripple solution, the transfer takes place in real time. When using the existing SWIFT network, there were intermediary banks between the remittance and receiving banks, which took an average of two to three days.
