Are there any technical details about the implementation of Fedwire?
Note- I realize this topic isn't directly about Ethereum, but considering that Fedwire is basically a direct competitor to the Ethereum network I thought it was relevant enough to ask here.
I'm curious about the technical details that make Fedwire work under the hood. What I'm imagining is that the Fed keeps a simple database which maps members' IDs to their account balance. An authenticated member can use Fedwire to debit their account balance as long as they credit another member's account the same amount. Is that all there is to it? Or is there some complexity I'm missing?
Although any general resources about the technical implementation of Fedwire would be of interest, a few specific details I'm interested in learning more about include:
- The transaction record – does the Fed keep a record of all transactions over the past 5 years, just as they expect each bank to do for their own transactions? Or do they keep a permanent record like Ethereum? Or no record at all?
- Comprehensiveness. Is the entire digital portion of the M1 money supply accessible via Fedwire? If not, where else are parts of it stored?
- Permissions. Could somebody at the Fed with the necessary permission theoretically initiate a transaction on behalf of one of the account holding banks? Or they always require the permission of the bank itself? (This is ignoring legality – just focusing on technical feasibility).
- Scalability. I know Fedwire can process up to ~800K transactions per day, but is there any technical reason for this limit? It seems like it should be able to support much higher TPS if it really is just a simple map/database.
submitted by /u/KennanCR
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