A recently published white paper from the World Economic Forum (WEF) predicts that blockchain technology will have a massive impact on the world’s economy, with potential revenue growth surpassing $1 trillion worldwide.

In the foreword of the report, the WEF discusses the potential effects of DLT, mentioning that the rise of technologies, such as the internet of things (IoT), blockchain, and artificial intelligence, will have a tremendous impact on the current system’s infrastructure. The report states that the “Digitalization and advanced technologies have the potential to significantly reduce processing times and the cost of cross-border movements of goods.”

In a section titled “Distributed ledger technology: Breaking the logjam,” the report specifically discusses the effects of blockchain and DLT on supply chains and trade, noting that through the use of secure databases, digital verification protocols, and smart contracts, DLT based systems are “faster, cheaper and safer than manual systems.”

In this section, the WEF report also notes that this technology is not just theorized, but that it has been tried and tested successfully, pointing to the BBVA’s success with implementing distributed ledger systems.

“Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (BBVA) has applied a distributed ledger system to reduce the time for submitting, verifying and authorizing an international trade transaction from over a week to just 2.5 hours,” the report said.

The report also discussed the potential impacts this increased efficiency could have on the markets, saying that DLT “could reduce trade finance operating costs by 50-70% and improve turnaround times three- to fourfold.”

One of the most important and noteworthy statistics in the report was regarding DLT’s effects on the existing trade gap, which is estimated to grow to $2.4 trillion by 2025. The report states that distributed ledger technology can reduce the trade gap significantly:

“Left unsolved, the trade finance gap will rise to more than $2.4 trillion by 2025, according to Bain & Company estimates. However, a viable solution has emerged. Bain’s modeling estimates that new digital technologies, especially distributed ledger technology, can reduce a large part of this gap, facilitating about $1.1 trillion of new trade volumes globally… Trade allows countries to specialize in industries; it helps technologies and ideas to spread, and yields economies of scale. But a major impediment stands in the way of expanding trade and making it more efficient and safe: namely, paper-intensive, manual processes.”

It is important for investors to understand that, although the crypto markets are in a persisting bear market, cryptocurrency, DLT, and blockchain, have the potential to change the world and to alter the current system’s inefficiencies. The WEF's white paper confirms this belief.