confirmed Jenny Johnson, CEO and President of Franklin Templeton, a financial company
Jenny Johnson, CEO and president of Franklin Templeton, a financial firm with $1.6 trillion in assets under management, recently reiterated her pro-blockchain stance during an interview with Bloomberg anchor David Westland during the Milken Institute’s 27th Annual Global Conference in California.
Among the hot topics the two discussed, Johnson had a lot to say about the topics of coding and generative artificial intelligence.
Coding
When asked how Franklin Templeton would benefit from the token, Johnson was quick to respond. “First of all, I am a big fan of blockchain and technology.”
It described a situation in which the company conducted a side-by-side trial of processing account records using both traditional methods and blockchain technology for six to eight months. As Johnson said, the results have been very positive. “We were amazed at the low cost of running it on the blockchain.”
Johnson added:
“It is a very powerful technology, and we believe it will open up a lot of new investment opportunities. “Honestly, eventually, I think ETFs and mutual funds will all be on the blockchain.”
She attributed this prediction to the “high costs” associated with verifying data between disparate systems – a problem that blockchain technology was intentionally designed to solve. Johnson also noted that once data is reconciled internally, financial institutions and stakeholders will still need to verify data between third parties.
“In the case of blockchain, there is only one source of truth,” she said.
Cash and temporary savings can lead to more diversified investment opportunities, according to Johnson. She cited the use case of pop star Rihanna, who issued a series of 300 NFTs that gave their owners a small percentage of royalties to one of the artist’s songs via a smart contract.
This is a reference Johnson has made in the past. As Cointelegraph reported in October of 2023, the CEO relayed Rihanna’s story during an interview on CNBC’s Delivery Alpha where she discussed tokenization as “securitization on steroids.”
Generative artificial intelligence
Then the conversation turned to generative AI. Johnson acknowledges the usefulness of generative AI systems, but also warns that they are “like a child who gets an ‘A’ in English and an ‘F’ in maths.”
The CEO noted that Franklin Templeton had recently partnered with Microsoft to build an AI-powered sales assistant, and later added that there were investment opportunities in this area. She also praised the potential of AI-powered translation services to bridge language barriers in finance.
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