Welcome to The Fintech Files, your weekly roundup from FN’s fintech correspondent Yolanda Bobeldijk, keeping you up-to-date with the latest developments in financial tech and innovation.

Your own private blockchain
The trouble with blockchain is that its biggest appeal is at the same time its biggest flaw. The idea that everyone is on the same network, and the transaction gets validated by the group, is both the crypto-utopian dream and the reason why big banks, each with their own empire to protect, will be cautious. But here is some good news for the banks; you can go it alone on the blockchain. Wells Fargo has opted to use blockchain for internal transfers, the Fintech Files has learnt. For a few months it has been testing how it can book transactions between its group companies using Corda Enterprise, the blockchain developed by R3. The tests were successful and it is now deploying this new tech at scale across the group. Wells Fargo declined to comment other than saying it is “currently evaluating several blockchain platforms”. But once the bank is happy with the internal use of the tech, it could look into linking up to other banks, my source added.