Last year I sat in a room with a payments team at a mid-size bank. Nothing dramatic. No crisis. Just a tiny plan: add a new type of on-chain asset to an app, and let clients move it fast.
On paper, it felt easy.
Then the real world showed up. The legal team asked, “Where does client data go?” The risk team asked, “Can we prove who did what?” The tech team asked, “Which chain tools do we need to run?” And the ops team asked the one that always stings: “How do we support it at 3 a.m.?”
The room got quiet.
Someone said, “So… are we building a whole new stack again?”
That’s the common bank pain. Not “blockchain is slow.” Banks can move fast when the rails are clear. The pain is integration drag. Every new chain can mean new wallets, new node ops, new key rules, new audits, new support playbooks. And if the chain is fully public, the bank hits another wall: privacy. Not “hide crimes” privacy. Simple client safety. Trade sizes. Buyer lists. Deal terms. Stuff banks cannot splash on a public feed.
This is where Dusk aims to fit. Not as a magic wand. More like a design choice: make the base layer modular, so banks can plug in what they need, and ship in smaller steps.
Dusk is built with a modular architecture meant for finance use cases, where privacy and rule checks matter.
What “modular L1” means on Dusk, in plain words
A lot of chains act like a single big machine. One engine does all jobs at once: keep the ledger, run apps, spread data, and handle privacy. That can work. But when you want to change one part, you end up touching the whole machine. Banks hate that. For good reason.
Dusk leans into a different idea: separate the jobs.
Think of it like a modern kitchen.
You do not buy one mega tool that bakes, fries, cools, and cleans. You want a reliable base setup (power, water, safety), then tools on top that can change as needs change. That’s the vibe of a modular stack.
In Dusk’s current direction, the base is DuskDS, described as the layer that handles consensus, settlement, and data availability. It’s the part that makes the chain “real.” Blocks, finality, staking, and the core ledger.
Then you have execution layers on top, where apps live.
One is DuskEVM, which aims to run EVM-style apps. In simple terms: many dev teams already know Ethereum tools. So if a bank dev team can use familiar tools, they can move faster and make fewer “new chain” errors. Dusk’s multilayer plan says this setup is meant to cut rollout time and speed up links with common tooling.
There is also a privacy-focused path: Dusk’s network design includes privacy tech like zero-knowledge proofs (ZK). That term sounds scary, but the simple idea is this: prove a claim without showing the raw data. Like proving you are over 18 without sharing your full birth date.
Dusk also talks about selective disclosure, which is basically “show the right facts to the right party when needed.” Not all the time. Not to everyone.
One more piece matters for “shipping faster,” even if it sounds nerdy: how a chain spreads messages. Dusk uses Kadcast instead of random gossip. Plain meaning: it tries to move data in a more planned path, so speed and load are more steady. That helps when you want a network that behaves the same way under stress.
How Dusk’s modular setup can help banks ship faster (and where it still won’t)
Let’s connect this to bank reality.
Banks ship faster when they can do three things:
First: reuse what already works.
If a bank team can lean on known tools, they save time. Dusk’s shift toward an execution layer that supports common EVM tooling is basically a bet on that. Less time learning new dev flows. Less time writing custom links. More time testing the product that users will touch.
Second: keep rule checks clean.
Banks need logs. They need clear steps. They need strong finality, so a trade is a trade. Dusk’s design puts settlement and consensus in the base layer (DuskDS), and positions it as the “truth layer” that other app layers inherit. That separation can make audits easier, because the bank can point to one core settlement rail, then explain the app layer on top.
Third: protect client data without breaking the rules.
This is the big one. A public chain can be like a glass office. Great for watching. Bad for doing deals. If every trade leaks who bought what and when, you can harm clients. Also, you can harm the market.
Dusk’s focus on privacy tech plus audit paths aims to give banks a middle route: keep sensitive details private, while still allowing proof when a trusted party must check. That can reduce the “we can’t launch because compliance said no” problem.
Now the honest part.
Modular does not mean simple. It means separated. You still need good ops. You still need strong key control. You still need clear policy: who can see what, and when. And banks will still demand deep reviews before they go live.
Also, market reality matters. Even a well-designed stack needs real users, real apps, real liquidity, and stable support tools. A bank does not pick tech only because it is neat. It picks what it can run safely, staff reliably, and explain to regulators with a straight face.
So the more fair way to say it is this:
Dusk’s modular L1 approach is built to reduce the “new chain tax.”
Not erase it. Reduce it.
If Dusk can keep the base settlement layer stable, while letting banks and dev teams build on top with familiar tools and privacy options, that is a real path to faster shipping. It’s the boring kind of “fast.” The kind banks actually like.
Conclusion
Banks do not fear speed. They fear unknown risk. A modular Layer 1 like Dusk tries to make the risk more trackable by splitting core chain duties from app duties, and by treating privacy as a normal finance need, not a side feature.
If that design holds up in real use, it can help banks move from “6 months of glue work” to “ship, test, expand.” Still careful. Still rule-first. Just less stuck.
