The Finanser’s Week: 24th March – 30th March 2014

Our biggest stories of the past week are ...

Data wars: why Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon will eat the banker's lunch

I chaired a meeting of bankers last night, and we talked a lot about data and data leverage.   One thing that bubbled up to the service over and over again was the threat of GAFA – Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon.

The time is ripe for disruption in banking

Building on yesterday’s debate about Google and co coming into banking, and the previous discussions of such, I was shocked to stumble across a survey this week that shows the attitude of Millennials (people born from the 1980s to 2000 that grew up with the internet).

Forget operational risk, let's talk about systems risk

I know that I keep blogging to banks to rip out and replace their core systems if they’re not fit for purpose, but today the point really rammed home hard. 

The biggest barrier to entry to banking is the regulator

I’m just preparing a presentation in Canada and realised that, like most countries, the competitive landscape of Canadian banking has not changed much in the last century.  Sure, there’s been some M&A and sure, the big banks are competing hard with each other but, outside that?  Here’s the issue: the major banks in most countries were determined decades ago and they have changed hardly at all since.

What does a Banking Union mean for Europe?

We had another great launch meeting of the Financial Services Club in Slovakia last week.  The focus of the meeting was What does the European Banking Union mean for CEE banks? with a panel discussion comprising myself alongside Bob Fuller, Chief Administration Officer, Fixnetix; Jozef Sikela, CEO, Slovenska Sporitelna; and Marek Licák  Director of Macro-prudential policy department at the National bank of Slovakia.

The major general news stories of the past week include ...  

Nat Rothschild’s bust-up with wealthy Bakrie family turns into Twitter storm - The Independent
You know a divorce is getting messy when one side descends to accusations  such as “your dad is an evil genius” and references to a “pile of turd”.        

Row as Swiss pick UK banker to run watchdog - The Independent
Switzerland has named the British banker Mark Branson as the new head of its financial market regulator, it emerged yesterday.        

RBS Citizens fails Federal Reserve stress test - The Telegraph
US arm of taxpayer-owned bank barred from raising dividends        

Carlyle poaches JPMorgan investment bank CEO - Financial Times
Michael Cavanagh becomes joint chief operating officer

Fury as FCA is accused of wimping out of tough new regulations on payday loans - The Independent
MPs and consumer groups have criticised the City Watchdog for lacking teeth ahead of its taking over responsibility for payday lenders next month.        

Lloyds caught in new PPI storm: Taxpayer-backed bank saved tens of millions of pounds by wrongly cutting compensation to customers - The Independent
One of Britain’s biggest banks has cost victims of the payment protection insurance (PPI) scandal tens of millions of pounds by wrongly cutting their compensation awards, a new investigation claims.        

Britain may rue the day it killed on investment banks - The Telegraph
Barclays is the latest British lender to review its investment banking arm. We look at the repercussions for the economy        

Did Hyman Minsky find the secret behind financial crashes? - BBC
Did this man discover the cause of financial crashes?

Fraudsters in fake uniforms target clients of Britain's oldest bank - The Telegraph
C Hoare & Co has alerted customers to the ploy and urged them to tighten security as it strengthens its own defences        

Nasdaq rethinks Amazon cloud partnership - Financial Times
The exchange operator is restructuring the FinQloud service following the departure of top executives and others associated with the project.