ALGORAND CHOSEN AS PUBLIC BLOCKCHAIN TO SUPPORT DIGITAL GUARANTEES PLATFORM IN ITALY

BOSTON and MILAN, Dec. 13, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Algorand Inc., a world leader in Layer-1 blockchain technology, has been selected to be the public blockchain that will support an innovative digital guarantees platform in Italy. The company today joined the Bank of Italy and the Italian insurance authority IVASS, along with more than 30 financial institutions at an event in Milan to illustrate how bank and insurance guarantees can be issued on digital ledger technologies (DLT) also known as blockchain. 

The event, hosted by CETIF, the Research Center for Technologies, Innovations and Finance of the Catholic University of Milan, will include presentations and live technology demonstrations as part of a three-day forum. CETIF Advisory has been leading an ecosystemic effort to develop a blockchain-based open "Digital Sureties" platform that will serve the needs of Italy's banking and insurance markets.

The new platform is expected to become operational in early 2023 and will be the first time an EU Member State enables the use of blockchain technology for bank and insurance guarantees. Algorand is the only public blockchain that the Digital Sureties platform uses.

It is expected that a significant percentage of bank and insurance guarantees will leverage digital ledger technologies as part of Italy's National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP). The EU allocated roughly 200B Euros to Italy, the largest allocation made to any country, to be used for co-grants and co-loans as part of the EU Recovery Plan. The EU launched the program, considered to be the most significant stimulus package in Europe's history, to boost economic recovery following the Covid-19 crisis. Blockchain is ideally suited to these types of programs given the technology's ability to provide fast, efficient, low-cost, and scalable data transactions. Even more importantly, digital ledger technologies help protect against fraud – a known challenge with bank and insurance guarantees.

"We selected Algorand because of its unparalleled level of innovation and security among permissionless DLTs, as well as because of its leadership in sustainability," said Federico Rajola, professor, CETIF. "Our goal is to help Italy not only recover from the economic impact of Covid-19, but also excel through innovation and leadership. Our ecosystemic projects are meant to help generate strategic platforms, such as the Digital Sureties platform supported by Algorand. We believe these platforms can and will dramatically contribute to the country's competitive sustainability for the benefit of all."