Long-term partnership with Enigio will enable Lloyds Bank to digitise its trade finance documentation, delivering faster, more affordable, flexible, sustainable and secure blockchain solutions for its clients

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Lloyds Bank has partnered with Swedish fintech firm Enigio to digitise promissory notes, bills of exchange and bills of lading through the use of blockchain technology.

Enigio’s proprietary solution enables the creation of digital documents that can be owned by an individual and transferred between parties. Moreover, original digital documents can be distinguished from copies, just like their paper-based counterparts.

Unlike other digital trade solutions that require all the parties involved to subscribe to digital platforms, Enigio’s trace:original only requires the document creator to be its user.

The long-term partnership was established after Lloyds Bank and Enigio got involved in the UK’s first digital promissory note and digital bill of exchange transactions. It is also part of the bank’s ongoing digital strategy and paperless trade initiative.

Testing the benefits of blockchain technology in practice, Lloyds executive Gwynne Master concluded that “Existing industry-wide trade solutions are, comparably, much slower, more cumbersome and more environmentally intensive than their digital counterparts.”

Therefore, Lloyds Bank and Enigio will now widen the application of Enigio’s trace:original solution to promissory notes, bills of exchange and bills of lading. The partners will also explore opportunities to feature trace:original documents within wider trade finance products, e.g. documentary collections and credits.