Today the Global Blockchain Business Council (GBBC) announced a merger with digital assets standards body Global Digital Finance (GDF). Two other similar organizations that merged with the GBBC were the Post-Trade Distributed Ledger (PTDL) Group in 2018 and the Interwork Alliance for token standards last year. These make up two of its five working groups.
The GDF has ten of its own working groups, including sanctions and a private markets digitisation group with startups and incumbent institutions building out the security tokens sector. Sandra Ro, CEO of GBBC has been a board member of GDF for some time.
The combined group will have more than 500 institutional members. The GBBC has a greater U.S. presence compared to the GDF, with the new GBBC Digital Finance group will be based in the United Kingdom with teams mainly in EMEA and APAC.
“The rapid growth and viability of blockchain, crypto, and digital assets means there is a clear need for effective, harmonized regulation built on a robust global framework,” said Lawrence Wintermeyer, GDF Board Chair. “Leading global institutions and leaders need to work with each other, with governments and with regulators to deliver this framework, and there is a vital role for GBBC and GDF to play in facilitating and driving this crucial collaboration.”
The announcement comes at Davos, five years after the initial formation of the GBBC by Bitfury, the Bitcoin mining company. Since then, the who’s who of the corporate world has joined the GBBC, which is chaired by Accenture’s blockchain and metaverse lead David Treat. Other members include BNY Mellon, CLS Group, Credit Suisse, EY and JP Morgan.
