On August 16, Standard Chartered Bank successfully leveraged blockchain technology to conduct Bangladesh’s first blockchain transaction by issuing a Letter of Credit (LC) for Viyellatex Ltd.

Standard Chartered Bank is the biggest international bank in Bangladesh, with a presence of over 115 years in the country. Viyellatex Ltd is a ready-made garment exporter that imports textile items from Viyellatex Spinning. 

LC was issued by Standard Chartered Bank for the trade between garment exporter Viyellatex Ltd and Viyellatex Spinning. The transaction was entirely paperless and completed digitally through Contour’s network.

Most of the raw materials of the ready-made garment industry are sourced locally through inland LC, which requires a lot of tedious paperwork. If the transactions are moved into a paperless blockchain, major efficiency can be achieved in local trade.

CEO of Contour Carl Wegner said,

“Global trade lacks a solution that drives out inefficiencies, improves data transparency and enables interoperability between all trade participants. The long-established elements of trade finance don’t have sufficient integration, ultimately causing friction and unnecessary administration.”

These may cause significant barriers to global trade growth, adding complexity, increasing cost, and delaying the process for both banks and corporate. These issues can be overcome by the Contour network.

Contour is a distributed trade network that gives enhanced collaboration over the main elements of trade with all participants utilizing the network to create and renew trade data in real-time.

Contour’s blockchain network was built on R3’s Corda blockchain. Likewise, in order to complete a 100,000 euro money market security transaction German banking and tech giants have utilized Corda’s platform.