SINGAPORE (Nov 14): The inaugural FinTech Festival in Singapore got off to a flying start on Monday, with OCBC Bank claiming to be the first bank in Southeast Asia to make cross-border payment using blockchain technology.

The bank successfully made two pilot payments on Nov 8. The first was a funds transfer between OCBC Bank Singapore and OCBC Malaysia; and the second was between OCBC Bank Singapore and Bank of Singapore, its private banking arm.

The transactions were made using technology provided by OCBC Bank and local payment solutions company BCS Information Systems (BCSIS).

Proponents of blockchain technology say that it is more secure, more efficient, and more transparent than what is in use today.

The bank has plans to extend the use of blockchain technology to other financial products and service applications.

“We hope this will be a catalyst for more banks to adopt the blockchain technology so that, together, we can achieve efficiency and cost effectiveness while delivering more high-value financial services to our consumers,” says Praveen Raina, Senior Vice President, Group Operations & Technology, OCBC Bank.

“We will continue to leverage emerging technologies and work with the banks to create superior payment experiences for customers,” says Ricky Lim, Managing Director of BCSIS.

OCBC’s announcement today was made in conjunction with the start of the inaugural week-long Singapore FinTech Festival organised by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS).

The festival was originally targeted to have just 1,000 participants. However, the number of registered attendees has ballooned to close to 11,000 from more than 50 countries, according to Roy Teo, Director of FinTech & Innovation Group at MAS.

Speaking at the launch of the event on Monday morning at Aviva’s Digital Garage, Teo described the festival as the birth of a “bigger than expected, premature and oversized” baby, “with no epidural and very, very painful.”

Sopnendu Mohanty, MAS’ Chief FinTech Officer, called the festival an event that will help bring the global fintech community together just as the world of finance and technology come together at a new level.

“The Festival will foster the thriving fintech ecosystem in Singapore and beyond, as we strive towards establishing Singapore as a Smart Financial Centre and a world-class fintech hub,” he adds.