Multinational investment banking firm Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. has predicted a strong future for blockchain technology, the distributed digital ledger that powers Bitcoin.

The group sent an Emerging Theme Radar research note to clients Wednesday, saying, “While the Bitcoin hype cycle has gone quiet, Silicon Valley and Wall Street are betting that the underlying technology behind it, the blockchain, can change … well everything.”

Blockchain as an alternative to existing transfer systems was explained as follows: “Once considered the underlying pipes of Bitcoin, this technology is … ushering in a new set of tools to cut costs and challenge the profit pool of the middle-man with a promise to make centralized institutions obsolete.

“This solution promises to not just address consumer opportunities but also those for the far more lucrative enterprise.

“[The blockchain] has the potential to redefine transactions and the back office of a multitude of different industries. From banking and payments to notaries to voting systems to vehicle registrations to wire fees to gun checks to academic records to trade settlement to cataloging ownership of works of art, a distributed shared ledger has the potential to make interactions quicker, less-expensive and safer.”

Author Robert D. Boroujerdi did note, though, that the path to the adoption for Blockchain may not be simple, stating that the “hype is high” around the technology and that “roadblocks” remain before the technology’s potential can be fully realized.

“Bitcoin was just the opening act, with the Blockchain ready to take center stage,” he added.

True believers

Goldman Sachs isn’t the first big bank to take an interest in the potential offered by Blockchain technology, with some of its U.S. competitors being members of the R3 group, a fact noted by the company in this report.

While one of many being bullish on Blockchain, it’s more icing on the cake for those investing in or running startups in a year where Blockchain-based solutions have been proposed for all sorts of different applications.

The question now isn’t whether the Blockchain is the future of online digital ledgers, but when and in what form will they be implemented, and what are some of the applications not yet thought of that it could be applied to.

2016 will be an interesting and indeed perhaps an exciting year in this space.

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