In the future development process of supply chain, blockchain as a key industry of digital economy, the alliance chain will focus on the development of blockchain service platforms and application solutions in the fields of fintech, supply chain management, government services and so on, and improve the regulatory mechanism. In the process of technological development and scenario landing, blockchain technology plays an increasingly prominent role in enabling the real economy. The solution of blockchain and supply chain can effectively avoid many original problems.

1. Transparency of supply chain information

There are many information islands in the supply chain, and the lack of information exchange between enterprises limits the verification of a lot of financing information. For example, different vendors and system versions of supply chain management systems, enterprise resource management systems, and financial systems are used by multiple entities, making it difficult to connect the systems. Information is hard to share.

By solving the problem of information islanding through blockchain technology, multiple stakeholders can make rules in advance to realize data interchange and information sharing. At the heart of the blockchain is a distributed ledger database that gives participants equal access to information, with any party having the right to see all information but not to modify or delete it. Features such as decentralization, transparent visualization, non-tampering and traceability make blockchain an effective technical means to support the transformation and upgrading of supply chain finance.

In the traditional supply chain management, the production information, commodity information and capital information distributed in each node of the supply chain are separated from each other, which cannot flow smoothly along the supply chain and lacks the information platform built around the core commodity. Blockchain technology supports multi-party participation and information exchange and sharing, which can promote data democratization, integrate fragmented data sources, provide a strong guarantee for big data analysis based on supply chain, and make it possible to credit investigation and risk control of big data.

2. Provide core enterprise credit

The decentralized and tamper-proof features of blockchain solve the problem of authenticity of transaction data information in the supply chain. In practice, core enterprises often introduce ERP system as their own financial information management system. Although the data in the ERP system is not easy to change, commercial banks still worry about the possibility of core enterprises colluding with suppliers or dealers to tamper with transaction data information.

Blockchain technology has the characteristics of consistency, not easy to change, and decentralization, while the data on the blockchain has the characteristics of time stamp, no repeated records, etc. Even if a node's transaction data can be tampered with, the traces left behind can be easily detected, addressing banks' concerns about tampering with information. Therefore, when commercial banks apply blockchain technology to their supply chain finance business, they can intuitively and conveniently check the situation of each transaction and the funding direction of loan companies, which greatly saves human and financial costs and improves the efficiency of supervision.

3. Abundant and credible trading scenarios

Banks need credible trading scenarios. Because smes cannot confirm the existence of trade relations, it is difficult to obtain bank funds under the existing banking risk control system. Similarly, the banking industry cannot penetrate the supply chain of customer acquisition and lending. Blockchain technology can provide trusted trade data.

For example, under the blockchain architecture, it provides online basic contracts, documents, payments and other structured and complete records to improve information transparency and achieve penetrating supervision. The use of blockchain technology in the audit stage can ensure the authenticity and integrity of the data source, facilitate checking whether the transactions behind are real, and ensure the reliability of circulation vouchers. In the stage of post-loan risk control, the constantly updated data flow provides support for the follow-up tracking of enterprise operation, making false transactions and repeated financing invisible. Blockchain application can give supply chain finance a higher level of security, eliminate the concern of financial institutions about enterprise information flow, solve the problem of smes unable to self-certify credit rating to a certain extent, and improve upstream and downstream enterprise information flow, capital flow, trade flow data chain.

4. Control performance risks

Automatic clearing based on smart contracts can reduce manual intervention, reduce operational risks, and ensure the security of collection. However, there are still many subjective factors, such as the illegal requirements put forward by the head of the power department of the core enterprise to the supplier. Although technology can solve many problems, it still needs social supervision to achieve a relatively level playing field. Smart contracts are seen as an important development direction for the most valuable and easily popularized business scenarios of blockchain. It encapsulates some state and preset rules, trigger execution conditions, and response plans for specific situations, stored as code in the blockchain contract layer. When the agreed conditions are met, the preset actions are automatically triggered.

The smart contract performance form that only relies on real business data not only ensures the smooth execution of the contract without third-party supervision, but also eliminates the possibility of artificial false operation. In the condition confirmation stage, according to the price and quality information updated in real time on the blockchain, the business information flow of external parties is checked, and the smart contract is started and executed after the transaction is concluded.

5. Reduce financing costs and improve efficiency

Under the prevailing market background of credit sales, suppliers in the upstream of the supply chain often have a large capital gap. But without the endorsement of their core companies, they struggle to get good loans from banks. Blockchain technology can reduce financing costs and improve efficiency. After transferring the trust of the core enterprise, smes can use the credit line of the core enterprise to obtain financing from banks at low interest rates. Factors that restrict the improvement of financing efficiency generally include preliminary examination and risk assessment, multi-level business registration and approval, lengthy payment procedures, etc., and high costs of all kinds, which further increase the financing cost of smes and reduce the efficiency.

In a word, supply chain finance is an important application field of blockchain technology, and supply chain finance is naturally compatible with blockchain. However, the application of blockchain technology in the field of supply chain finance should be viewed rationally, and the research and innovation should also be rational, pay attention to practice, and actively realize the implementation.