Bitcoin Daily: UK Brokerage Tests Ripple’s xRapid, Filipino Banks Pilot Ethereum Blockchain

Months after South Korea’s Financial Services Commission banned token sales, the country’s National Assembly is seeking to allow some initial coin offerings (ICOs), CoinDesk reported. Through proposed legislation, the assembly is seeking to allow ICOs if they come with investor protections.

And Frank Abagnale – the con-artist-turned-security-expert of “Catch Me If You Can” fame – thinks that blockchain is the next big thing, Fortune reported. He believes that banks and accounting firms will move to the blockchain. “Blockchain is the way of the future,” Abagnale said at a conference. “It is the best way to secure information, to secure it 100 percent.”

In other news, a few banks in the Philippines will experiment with a blockchain-based retail payments system, CCN reported. The goal of the project, which is called Project i2i, is to link rural banks in the country. With the pilot, five banks in Mindanao will test retail payments.

“With this [blockchain platform], they don’t have to spend anything,” said UnionBank technology and operations chief Henry Aguda. “They just have to load the application i2i in their computers, tablets or smartphones, then they can transact bank-to-bank connected to blockchain.”

And a broker based in the U.K. has completed a successful test of Ripple’s xRapid platform, Finance Magnates reported. Through the test, Currencies Direct was able to complete transactions in seconds that usually take three to five days.

Currencies Direct’s chief product officer, Brian Harris, called the trial a “resounding success.” While the company is looking into the next steps, he called the technology a “game changer.”

In other news, bitcoin enthusiasts with a sweet tooth are in luck: A new candy dispenser takes bitcoin as payment, The Next Web reported. The “sweetbit” device monitors transactions on blockchain.info and then dispenses an equivalent candy portion.

The device was created by David Knezić, who released the code for the machine to the world on Github. Beyond his original bitcoin candy machine, Knezić is at work on another machine, one that would work with Bitcoin’s lighting network.