Shenzhen issues first blockchain invoice

SHENZHEN - The tax bureau in Shenzhen and Tencent announced Friday that China's first blockchain-based invoice had been issued to a local restaurant.

According to the tax bureau, companies can submit applications for invoices and declare tax on the blockchain platform supported by Tencent, which will automatically generate invoices after transactions are completed.

Cai Yige, manager of Tencent's blockchain business, said the distributed ledger, a core technology of blockchain, enabled secure sharing and storage of transaction records among all parties in the invoicing process, making it impossible to tamper with invoice information.

The bureau and Tencent launched an innovation lab in May, to explore solutions to optimize tax services and prevent risks using cloud computing, artificial intelligence, blockchain and big data.