I see where you guys are coming from, but I thought the same thing about XRP.
"Why would banks need to use an outside company to transfer funds when they already have SWIFT or can come up with their own solution?"
And look at the price of Ripple in the last few days.
I don't see any reason not to gamble a few dollars on Factom.
Sure - it might be a good bet for a speculative gains, just as Ripple was. Nothing wrong with that gamble.
I personally try to trade on fundamentals, which has served me well in the long term.