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Coin Geek
11-06-2025
- Business
- Coin Geek
How TEA guarantees trust in accounting
Homepage > News > Business > How TEA guarantees trust in accounting Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... Traditional accounting systems are notorious for fraud and errors, especially double-entry bookkeeping. In today's economy, enterprises need a clear picture of their finances to save money where they can, and for this, they need 100% accurate information. With all the frontier technology available today, enterprises must find a way to guarantee their books are accurate, both for themselves and for auditors. Ironically, the solution lies in a concept that was fleshed out by Ian Grigg in 2005, but before we get there, let's examine the shortcomings of double-entry accounting. title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen=""> 'The first one is the oldest one, which is that you can have several books. You can show one book to the tax authority, and you can show another set of books to the bank and they could be different,' shared former auditor Torje Vingen Sunde, Co-founder & CTO of Abendum. 'The other shortcoming of double-entry accounting is that they are in data silos. They don't talk together,' he said. Blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI) expert Konstantinos Sgantzos, head of the environmental subsector of Megalopolis lignite mining directorate, is also a close friend of Grigg's and greatly admires his work. When asked to elaborate on the shortcomings of double-entry accounting, Sgantzos described it as 'an opinion' rather than a truth. 'You know, it is my opinion that my book says that, and that is true. And your book has your opinion. And we need to sink our opinions. So, it is my word versus yours. And if it happens to me and I lose the book, what happens? I must accept your truth from mine,' Sgantzos told CoinGeek. According to Grigg, double-entry accounting simply represents the founder's view of the company's situation. 'It's not reality,' he said. The solution to these challenges associated with traditional accounting systems can be found with Triple Entry Accounting (TEA), a concept Grigg is the co-inventor of. 'Triple entry accounting creates a set of records which are facts, as opposed to the old way, which is a set of records which are opinions. On those facts, you can automatically analyze them, such that part of the process of auditing is done for you automatically by the software and other parts are a lot easier,' Grigg explained. 'Now, this completely changes the paradigm of accounting. Accounting's no longer an opinion,' he said. Triple entry accounting does not turn bad people into good people. It creates a system where the full set of real transactions can be verified and cannot be altered or ignored. A @iang_fc explains, what Sam Bankman-Fried did by leaving out key transactions could not happen with… Sgantzos added, 'Triple-entry accounting basically expands upon double-entry bookkeeping. In essence, we had this debit and credit books, and the triple-entry accounting adds a third record that is basically a cryptographic proof that both books are in sync.' Juan Ignacio Ibañez, the General Secretary of the MiCA Crypto Alliance, is also a triple-entry accounting enthusiast who elaborated on the system's use cases. 'What it gives you is reliability at the basis of the bookkeeping, which then translates into reliability for the entire accounting edifice, and it also solves the problem of reconciliation by turning reconciliation from an activity to necessity, intrinsic reconciliation that is always there,' he shared. While reliable bookkeeping means reduced costs and increased efficiency, Ibañez said its easier for some industries to upgrade than others. 'The potential for triple-entry accounting in supply chains, for example, could be massive, but it will take a long time. More financial industries have more short-term potential, but I just think auditing in itself is the main industry to be disrupted in the short run,' he said. One question to be answered is whether triple-entry accounting systems should be blockchain-enabled. Blockchain itself may be an iteration of triple-entry accounting, but it can also enhance it. According to Grigg, it all depends on your environment. 'The easy answer is yes, just use a blockchain. It's not the only way. It might not be the best way. So the question then is, why would you use a blockchain?' 'This always comes back to the question of what's your environment? Who are your people? Are you in an adversarial world where if you and I are doing trade and I happen to be a bit naive, can you screw me over? And if that's the world we live in, blockchain is great for that because it locks everything down,' Grigg explained. For Sunde, who is looking through an auditor's lens, integrating a public, scalable, global blockchain such as BSV into a triple-entry accounting system is very important. 'With the introduction of blockchain this become much more feasible because this global ledger, you can use that to log everything. It makes it more compatible,' he said. Ibañez pointed out how utilizing blockchain brings decentralization to the triple-entry accounting system. 'The role of a third party in TEA is very limited, but you still need a third party for timestamping, ordering, you decentralize that bit as well with blockchain. And at the same time, you have an entire messaging and a data storage network that can be global, so it increases the potential of triple entry accounting,' he said. Blockchain-enabled or not, triple-entry accounting is clearly an enormous upgrade for accounting systems across all industries. Thanks to triple-entry accounting, we can build a more transparent accounting future, guaranteeing with 100% certainty that our numbers are always accurate. Watch: Triple Entry Accounting with Ian Grigg
Coin Geek
28-05-2025
- Business
- Coin Geek
TEA Malta Highlights: Transparent accounting for the digital age
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... The second Triple Entry Accounting (TEA) Conference took place at the Salini Resort in sunny Malta. The location was perfect for two days of discussing the academic and commercial opportunities surrounding Triple Entry Accounting while enjoying each other's company in the evenings, thanks to organized dinners and outings. title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen=""> Our group consisted of academics, auditors, entrepreneurs, inventors, students and other professionals interested in the future of triple entry accounting. Everyone in the room was engaged from start to finish each day, actively listening to presentations, asking questions and providing feedback, all conducted in a roundtable format. For those who are not aware, triple entry accounting creates tamper-evident, decentralized ledgers by adding a third, immutable entry shared among all parties involved. Blockchain is an implementation of triple entry accounting. Ian Grigg, the inventor of Triple Entry Accounting (and Ricardian Contracts), was the conference Chair and was crucial in inspiring the discussions. 'TEA is an exotic thing and there are a bunch of professionals out there who found it to be very interesting and we're all wondering what happens next,' Grigg shared with CoinGeek. 'So the goal of the conference is to bring as many of those people together and start swapping anecdotes and discussions and ideas about how to make it move forward,' he said. Arthur Doohan, Co-Chair of the TEA Conference, said the purpose of this conference and those that follow are to provide a focus for academic research and perhaps a clearing house for those who are practically trying to use it. 'Basically to foster the development and the utilization of triple entry practices,' he said. Renowned artificial intelligence (AI) expert Konstantinos Sgantzos, head of the environmental subsector of Megalopolis lignite mining directorate at PPC Group, believes TEA is a 'hidden gem' that needs to be projected in today's world. 'I think [TEA] solves problems that nobody saw…nobody saw those problems emanating before Triple Entry Accounting,' he said. A recent Block Dojo graduate, Bridget Doran, founder/CEO of Traceport, was also in attendance and said TEA had interested her for many years. 'I think that just the concept of triple entry accounting is what's really basic and so to hear all the different ideas and ways that it can be implemented is exciting,' she said. Throughout the two days, many real-world use cases of TEA were presented, including everything from Hollywood to auditing, informal savings groups, government-issued benefits and AI. 'Hollywood's famous for having opaque or fake accounting systems and depreciation schedules and things that can't be monitored or audited without a lot of money,' shared Ted Rivera, the founder of Block Chain Studios, LLC. 'And so I think triple entry accounting is just giving us a verifiable third party record that's immutable and auditable in real time,' he added. Torje Vingen Sunde, co-founder & CTO of Abendum, has a background in auditing and has made it his life's mission to get everyone onto a TEA system. 'We're not replacing the auditors. We're making the nature of the occupation much more attractive,' he shared after his presentation. 'We're automating the repetitive, less interesting, some would say boring, parts of the work, and we let the auditor spend more time on the interesting part of the work, which is getting to know the business, knowing the industry, using the evidence and putting everything together,' he said. Hakim Mamoni, Liquidity Controller of HoverTrusts, presented on informal saving groups, essentially groups of people who want to help each other save money. 'Those people are mostly managing cash. Triple entry accounting can help them create a system where it becomes more transparent for all the members of the group to see how the cash is being managed how where the cash is being lent, who is contributing correctly, who is paying their loans, etc etc,' he shared. The TEA Conference Manager, Andre Bonello, presented his vision on harnessing TEA to help families in need. 'In Malta and in Europe, there are a lot of people who are suffering from poverty and we can use technology to help these people,' he explained. 'Through the concept of CBDCs, there will be a specific currency dedicated to these people so they can have essential needs, such as food and medicine for them and their loved ones, so with the help of triple entry accounting, this could be done and it will be transparent, accountable,' Bonello added. Sgantzos talked about the synergies between AI and TEA, an area he is particularly passionate about. 'This era from the first model, ChatGPT, up until now, keeps pushing new data out that is created from AI. So the original information that came from humans, which are the original useful information, is constantly declining. So we need to mark this kind of content and there is no better way to do it than triple entry accounting and distributed ledger technology,' he explained. Educating newcomers on TEA was another focus of the event, particularly university students who were delighted to have the opportunity to attend. Robert Sciberras Herrera, a student at the University of Malta, said his main takeaway was how TEA can remove the repetitive nature of auditing, which is precisely what Sunde presented. '[TEA] could snatch that part of the repetitive work from the audit profession, and the practitioner could just focus on the theoretical aspects rather than the laborious, repetitive tasks,' Herrera shared. Thanks to thoughtful presentations, group discussion and engaging evening activities, everyone walked away from TEA Conference 2025 with a wonderful experience and excitement about what the future holds in this space. 'We saw through these presentations that people come up with a concept, with a purpose, with a goal for the future, which is very exciting,' said Bonello. 'There are all kinds of people; there are students who came here who do not understand about this system and who do not know anything about blockchain, but they're excited and they are here and we are here all together,' he added. Watch: Utilizing Triple Entry Accounting title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen="">
