10 Fintech predictions for 2016

There are a lot of Fintech forecasts out there but two of the best I spotted were by David Gyori and Pascal Bouvier, so I decided to take the areas I agree with most to provide a few headline Fintech predictions for 2016 of my own:

#1

PayPal will be a primary acquisition target in 2016.

#2

Facebook will launch basic banking and payments as part of their mobile app services.

#3

Alibaba starts to expand its payments, lending and wealth management operations to Europe and the US.

#4

A number of key mergers and acquisitions will take place with banks targeting to absorb the Betterments and Stripes of this world into their own operations.

#5

Whilst UK and USA remain global leaders in FinTech in 2016, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Japan and Australia will show strong offerings, whilst Africa, Israel, Luxembourg and the CEE region will also have an impact.

#6

The P2P lending model expands into new asset classes of credit risk with LendingClub announcing a new P2P mortgage lending offer.

#7

Insurance has been a quiet Fintech area so far, but a raft of new startups appear in 2016 with at least 100 digital insurance startups funded throughout the year.

#8

Regtech will become a big area of focus, aligning regulatory technologies with Fintech areas, particularly Peer to Peer Lending and Crowdfunding.

#9

Bitcoin will be overtaken by a large corporate-backed digital currency, fully hedged by traditional assets.

#10

Identity management startups built on consensus ledger technologies begin to flourish.