Goldman Sachs named Matthew McDermott as the new digital assets head on Thursday as the firm is looking at ways to launch its own digital assets. McDermot has an experience of running the investment bank’s internal funding operations as a managing director.
McDermott, who is based in London, has replaced Justin Schmidt in the role. He has a radical vision for the market and asserted that in the next decade you could see a financial system where all assets and liabilities are native to a blockchain.
“In the next five to 10 years, you could see a financial system where all assets and liabilities are native to a blockchain, with all transactions natively happening on chain,” McDermott said in an interview as quoted by CNBC
“So what you’re doing today in the physical world, you just do digitally, creating huge efficiencies. And that can be debt issuances, securitization, loan origination; essentially you’ll have a digital financial markets ecosystem, the options are pretty vast.”
Last month McDermott hired Oli Harris as head of strategy. Harris was instrumental in JPMorgan’s blockchain, Quroum, as well as its settlement coin, JPMCoin. At the new role, he is already looking at how blockchain can make savings in the inefficient repurchase, or “repo”, market used by banks to lend money to one another, as well as credit and mortgage markets.
McDermott also mentioned that Goldman might consider collaborating with its rival, JPM, as well as Facebook on future digital asset initiatives.
