Abstract 

On October 25, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee organized members to study blockchain. On the afternoon of October 26, the 14th meeting of the Standing Committee of the 13th Standing Committee of the National People's Congress voted to adopt and execute the Cryptography Law on January 1, 2020, providing additional support to the blockchain of distributed ledger technology to organize and record data through cryptology. 

According to the prediction of relevant international research institutions, the global blockchain market will amount to USD13.96 billion (equivalent to about RMB98.623 billion) in three years, and the annual compound growth rate of blockchain will be as high as 42.8% from 2017 to 2022. 

On October 25, the global market responded quickly and the stocks related to Bitcoin and blockchain rose sharply. In terms of A shares, after the opening of the American stock market on 25, the blockchain-related stocks in the Chinese stock market rose sharply according to information on irm.cninfo.com.cn. Among them, the stock of Thunder skyrocketed by 107.8% to USD4.82 per share, marking the largest single-day increase since listing. 

On October 26, the price of bitcoin rose above USD10,000, a new high in more than a month, up more than 30% in 24h. There are an increasing number of questions and responses about blockchain. 

The Green Legal Global Alliance Research Institute studied and organized the relevant news in a timely way. 

Messages from the senior administration official: take blockchain as an important breakthrough for independent innovation of core technologies. 

Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, stressed that the integrated application of the blockchain technology plays an important role in new technological innovation and industrial transformation. We should make the blockchain the core of independent innovation of core technologies, work to identify our main task, scale up investment in advancing a number of key core technologies, and accelerating the development of the blockchain technology and industrial innovation. 

Xi Jinping gave a speech when he presided over the study. He pointed out that the blockchain technology has been applied in digital finance, Internet of things (IoT), intelligent manufacturing, supply chain management, digital asset trading and other fields. At present, major countries in the world are advancing the development of the blockchain technology. As China has a favorable foundation in the field of blockchain, efforts should be made to speed up the development of the blockchain technology and industry innovation and proactively promote the integrative development of blockchain, economy and society. 

Xi Jinping stressed that we should strengthen fundamental research, improve the initial innovation ability and strive to make China take the forefront of theory of blockchain, occupy the commanding heights of innovation and gain new industrial advantages. Efforts should be made to promote collaborative research, expedite breakthroughs in core technologies, and provide safe and controllable technical support for the development and application of blockchain. The research on the standardization of blockchain should be strengthened and China's international discourse power and rule-making power improved. Work should be done to speed up industrial development, give full play to market advantages, and further open up the innovation chain, application chain and value chain. A blockchain industry ecosystem should be put into place to accelerate the in-depth integration of blockchain, AI, big data, IoT and other cutting-edge information technologies and promote integrated innovation and integrated application. Intensified efforts should be made to build the talent team, establish and improve the talent training system, put into place a variety of high-caliber talent training platforms and cultivate a number of leading figures and high-level innovation teams. 

Xi Jinping pointed out that we should seize the opportunity of technology integration, functional expansion and industrial segmentation of the blockchain technology, and play the role of blockchain in facilitating data sharing, optimizing business processes, cutting down operating costs, improving synergy efficiency and building a credible system. A good job should be done to advance the deep integration of the blockchain and the real economy and cope with difficulties of small and medium-sized enterprises in getting loans, difficulties of banks in controlling risks and difficulties of authorities in regulation. The blockchain technology should be employed to develop innovative digital economy modes, provide impetus for creating a convenient, efficient, stable and transparent environment with fair competition, render services to propel structural reform of the supply side and realizing effective matchmaking of supply and demand in each industry and provide support to speed up continued replacement of old growth drivers with new ones and promote high-quality economic development. Work should be done to apply "blockchain+" in the field concerning people's livelihood, and take the initiative to promote the application of the blockchain technology in the fields of education, employment, pension, precision poverty alleviation, health care, commodity anti-counterfeiting, food safety, public welfare and social assistance in a bid to provide more intelligent, convenient and better public services to the mass. Efforts should be made to propel the combination of the underlying technology services of the blockchain and the construction of new smart cities, find ways to promote and apply blockchain technology in the fields of nformation infrastructure, smart transportation, energy and electricity, and achieve intelligent and precision urban management. The blockchain technology should be employed to promote greater connectivity among cities in information, capital, talent, credit and other aspects so as to ensure the orderly and efficient flow of production factors in the region. Efforts should be made to find ways to utilize the blockchain data sharing mode, realize joint maintenance and employment of government data across departments and regions, promote joint handling of services and further the "one-step government service" reform in a bid to bring better government services to the mass. 

Xi Jinping emphasized that we should strengthen the guidance and standardization of the blockchain technology, intensify research and analysis of risks related to blockchain security, closely follow the development trend and actively explore the law of development. Endeavors should be made to put into place a security system that adapts to the blockchain technology mechanism and guide and encourage blockchain developers and platform operators to strengthen industry self-discipline and fulfill security responsibilities. The regulation of network in accordance with the law should be implemented in the blockchain management so as to advance safe and well-arranged development of blockchain. 

Xi Jinping pointed out that the relevant departments and leading comrades should pay attention to the current situation and trend of the blockchain technology and improve the ability to use and manage the blockchain technology, so as to make the blockchain technology exert a greater role in building a network power, developing the digital economy and boosting the economic and social development. 

Why is it made a national strategy? 

The blockchain is essentially a decentralized distributed ledger database and represents a range of data blocks that are produced through cryptography associations. Each data block contains information for validating multiple transactions. 

Decentralized distributed storage makes data open and transparent and enables data to directly generate value. Tamper-proof and traceable information brings security and integrity and as a result leads to more trust among people. Blockchain is believed to be another wave after the Internet and expected to bring great opportunities for change for all walks of life as infrastructure. 

At present, major countries in the world are advancing the development of the blockchain technology. It was stressed in the above speech that we should strengthen fundamental research, improve the initial innovation ability and strive to make China take the forefront of theory of blockchain, occupy the commanding heights of innovation and gain new industrial advantages. To "take the forefront of theory of blockchain", to "occupy the commanding heights of innovation" and "gain new industrial advantages" make it clear that China has a clear and unique goal in the blockchain field, that is, to be No.1. 

Chen Chun, a professor of Zhejiang University and academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, made a presentation at the group study meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. He said at CCF CNCC 2019 sponsored by China Computer Federation on October 12 that the development of China's blockchain industry is greeting a favorable environment and the research focus of China's blockchain technology will be on the key technology of the consortium blockchain and the blockchain regulation technology. 

China tops the list in the number of blockchain patent applications. 

China enjoys a favorable foundation in the blockchain field. With the support of a range of policies, the blockchain technology and industry has advanced rapidly and starts to integrate with other industries. 

In 2016, the State Council issued the 13th Five-year Plan for National Informatization to list the blockchain technology as a strategic frontier technology. In June 2018, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the Action Plan for the Development of Industrial Internet (2018-2020) to encourage application research and exploration of blockchain and other emerging cutting-edge technologies in the industrial Internet. 

In recent years, China has maintained the largest number of blockchain technology patent applications. According to the 2018 E-banking Survey Report released by China Financial Certification Authority (CFCA) at the end of last year, China contributed over half of blockchain-related patent applications around the globe. By the end of 2017, China had over 1,200 patent applications, outnumbering that of the US and ranking No.1 in the world. 

Finance is the main application field at present. 

At present, blockchain is most frequently applied in the financial field. Among the global blockchain market shares in 2018, the financial industry accounted for the largest share, representing 60.5%. 

At present, a number of Chinese banks, including Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China, China Construction Bank, have applied the blockchain technology to poverty alleviation fund management, cross-border and inter-bank business, letter of credit, supply chain finance and other fields. 

In addition to the above practice areas, the digital currency of the PBC, another part of the blockchain, is also much concerned. Tobias, head of money and capital markets at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), said China is expected to become the first to issue a digital currency from the central bank. 

What needs to be improved in blockchain? 

Liu Xiaolei, head of the Department of Finance, Guanghua School of Management, Peking University, pointed out that the key to blockchain is data sharing among different institutions and departments. When data sharing is achieved among departments, some problems concerning people's well-being can be addressed. For example, after Loudi City, Hunan Province puts data about real estate, water, electricity and gas in the blockchain, one-stop bank loan service and transfer of property right can be achieved for house buyers. Besides, the one-stop transfer of water, electricity and gas accounts is also credited to the application of data among departments. 

Further, the blockchain technology also plays an active role in the field concerning people's livelihood, such as precision poverty alleviation, health care, pension, food security and other fields. Regarding the role of the blockchain in the real economy, it can also provide ways to cope with corporates' difficulties in financing and costly financing. 

What should be averted in the blockchain? 

Liu Xiaolei said that the blockchain industry can develop in a long run as long as it follows a steady path. It is definite that we don't want short-term hype. The blockchain applications we encourage are more about sharing information and data among institutions, government departments, or enterprises and more about the application of a consortium blockchain. In fact, it has nothing to do with bitcoin and the like. At present, we should keep on guard against enterprises and individuals who violate the law under the banner of blockchain. The blockchain technology will give impetus to the construction of a digital China. At present, we are still on the way to make clear how to play the role of data as China as a large number of data and how to make data a new production factor of production and capital. 

Data are different from production factors such as machines and factories as they are hard to share. In spite of this, it bears a very big advantage, that is, there is no depreciation after many times of use. On the contrary, more sharing and use can produce better results. So, how to share data with more people? A unified data center should be available to gather data. It is a process of long-term generation and continuous application.  The blockchain, as an underlying technology, is an excellent application scenario to make data means of production. 

Ma Guangyuan, a financial commentator of CCTV-2, believes that China should develop a reasonable blockchain industrial policy. First, at present, the decision makers have paid close attention to cutting-edge technology areas. Although the blockchain technology has not developed for long, it has been incorporated in China's national policy. Second, industry policies should be developed to guide and encourage those engaged in technology.  If China hopes to be a leader in the next generation of Internet-based technology, has a voice and takes part in the standard establishment, technology plays an important role and what kinds of talents are encouraged holds much more importance. 

Source | finance.sina.com.cn, cctvyscj, www.yicai.com, etc.