Payment processing and banking in the United States is woefully behind the rest of the world. Globally, the system is complex, obtuse, and fragmented enough to result in a shanty town of technological solutions that are just lipstick on a pig.

The hope here is that the introduction of blockchains and cryptocurrencies into public discourse, and public excitement regarding a digital mechanism to store and receive value might be the kick in the pants that the banks need to roll-out better banking tools and systems. Furthermore, the first bank to run a publicly auditable ledger which can be validated externally will set a precedent for transparency.

I'm not sure what the future of cryptocurrencies will be (though I'm bullish), but those would be huge wins for society.