Chris Skinner's blog Shaping the future of finance

Continuing yesterday’s discussions about a big bank’s conference, I was intrigued at how often the subject of cryptocurrencies and bitcoin came up. But there again, it’s a topical thing at the moment with the price of bitcoins surging past the $4,000 mark and Goldman Sachs going …

Things we’re reading today include … Lloyds boss urges UK to maintain its trade relationship with the EU Labour demands review into City of London role in money-laundering Banks consider 555 fraud ‘hotline’ Thirty years ago this week, Wall Street slid into the abyss Goldman …

I was at a large bank’s wealth management conference recently, where the CEO was being quizzed about various areas including a lot about technology and FinTech. He made several statements that I noted with interest: “Roboadvisory services improves our speed-to-market and human productivity, but does …

Things we’re reading today include … Special Report: Backroom battle imperils $230 million cryptocurrency venture Could the 1987 stock market crash happen again? Lloyds ‘mugged’ shareholders with HBOS deal in teeth of financial crisis, High Court told UK banks ‘exposed to money laundering in South …

It’s been an interesting few weeks, watching bitcoin’s rollercoaster ride as it rises to valuations over $4,000 and then dives to almost $2,000 before rising again to near $6,000. This is for an asset that just a year ago you could have purchased for a …

Things we’re reading today include … To change how you use money, Open Banking must break banks Bank of America’s Return to 1950s Style Banking Is Paying Off Virgin Money insists its credit card business is safer than the bigger banks FCA agrees to RBS …

I finally finished writing my new book. I’m not going to say too much about it, as it now has to go through a lengthy editing cycle and will be released next year. A key theme in the new book is financial inclusion and, to those …

Things we’re reading today include … City warns transition deal ‘disappearing by the day’ as May heads to Brussels  Fintech market moves beyond lending Wi-fi security flaw ‘puts devices at risk of hacks’ Financial regulator warns of growing debt among young people Uncertainty over Brexit …

I recently stumbled across a marketing campaign being run by UBS, which tries to answer the hardest questions in the world. The questions cover everything from equality to politics and, to illustrate what they are debating, here are a few examples: Why is there such a …

Things we’re reading today include … A Bank of England rate hike would be ‘extraordinary’ step for Britain’s Brexit economy As the quartet breaks up, central banking leadership flux looms Lloyds shareholders’ court case over HBOS takeover set to begin Can the UK make the …

The top blog posts of the last fortnight include … The next ten years of technology from Gartner and Skinner I just spotted that Gartner have made a series of ten bold predictions for IT 2018 and beyond. They are summarised nicely by Forbes and …

Things we’re reading today include … Who is John Flint? The new HSBC boss knows the business inside out UK banks plan biggest squeeze on consumer credit since 2008 Lloyds Bank swoops on Zurich’s UK pensions and savings business Equifax removes webpage after malware issue …

I’ve blogged on some of the themes I’m going to cover below, but the story gets clearer and clearer in my head the more I blog about and talk about it, so this version may be a little clearer than some that have gone before. …

I find it interesting as we move towards Open Banking and Open APIs through regulations at both the UK and EU levels. The push is for data sharing with trusted third parties with user consent. All well and good, you would think, but several surveys …

I blogged about the FinTech themes that came out of the Celero conference the other day and forgot to mention that I recently joined a one-day retreat at Payments International in London, as a facilitator. I don’t do such intimate work very often, where I …

This quote If you’re getting something for free, you are the product has been floating around for a while, and normally is related to Facebook and Google. It’s all about the fact that these companies are selling you to advertisers as clickbait. Facebook, Google, Twitter …

Following on from talking around the big ten tech themes last Friday, I thought I would follow up with five FinTech themes for right now.  This came out of a keynote speech I gave at Celero’s 9th annual technology conference in Canada last week. It was …

Things we’re reading today include … Swedish challenger bank Handelsbanken commits to UK but wants Brexit clarity Have we learned our lessons from the financial crisis? Don’t bank on it EU raids Polish and Dutch banking groups over fintech access Staley scrutinised as Barclays faces …

I just spotted that Gartner have made a series of ten bold predictions for IT 2018 and beyond. They are summarised nicely by Forbes and are: By 2021, early adopter brands that redesign their websites to support visual- and voice-search will increase digital commerce revenue …

Things we’re reading today include … Goldman Sachs boosts post-Brexit plans with Frankfurt office deal Fearless Girl statue firm faced down in equal pay row Exclusive: SEC’s corporate filing system vulnerable to denial of service attacks – memo Robo advice: buy, buy, buy Iceland PM …

I was talking about space exploration with a colleague the other day. They looked at me rather incredulously and wondered if I was a little bit barking mad. No, I’m quite serious, I explained, and put the case for the view that my children will …

Things we’re reading today include … Soaring rates of ‘shadow banking’ add to fears of Chinese debt, warns World Bank Orange is launching Orange Bank on November 2 Foiled £250m Brazil bank robbery ‘would have been biggest in the world’ U.S. lawmakers seek to shut …