Spain's CaixaBank has begun experimenting with quantum computing to help with risk analysis simulations on financial assets.
Using IBM's Framework Opensource Qiskit, an infrastructure that includes a simulator and a 16-qubit quantum computer, the bank has implemented a quantum algorithm to assess the financial risk of two portfolios - a mortgage portfolio and treasury bills portfolio - specifically created for the project using real data.
Ordinarily, the analysis requires thousands or millions of simulations, but the quantum algo needed just dozens, cutting the time needed from several days to a few minutes.
CaixaBank says it is now exploring the use of the technology applied to optimisation algorithms, machine learning and secure encryption methods, but warns it is likely to still be some time before the first commercial applications of quantum computing see the light.