The main discussions on the blog this week include ...
Fires to the left of me, floods to the right and here I am, stuck in the monsoon with you
I heard a statistic on the BBC that natural disasters due to weather are costing the insurance industry seven times more today than in the 1970s. Is that because people insure against such issues more today? Partly, but it’s also because there are more natural …
Why I bought a Watford FC shirt, when I’m a Spurs fan [bitcoin]
A while ago, I spotted that Watford was sponsored by Bitcoin. They must have made a mint out of that and will be buying up Harry Kane soon, if he’s not already gone somewhere else. Nevertheless, I wanted their shirt. In fifty years, who knows …
I’ve been close to Peter Vander Auwera for many years, thanks to Innotribe. He retired a few years ago on bitcoin – I wonder how many times I will use that line? – and became an artist. Great guy. But he’s still tracking me and …
BNPL became a big thing in August
Some years ago, July 2015 to be exact, I interviewed Niklas Adalberth, co-founder of Klarna. Niklas left the company shortly after but is still invested and, interestingly, is investing in other unicorns like Mollie. Not bad for a guy who was flipping burgers for a living …
What is ‘sustainable investing’?
I have a few friends who are climate deniers. That’s fine, they are entitled to their views, but I cannot accept that view. There’s too much science that shows the world is changing. Their argument – those who believe this is not a climate emergency …
This week's main headlines include:
- PayPal is exploring a stock-trading platform for U.S. customers
- Which European investment apps are crushing their competition?
- Funding Xchange embeds its lending marketplace on eBay
- Funding Circle launches buy-now-pay-later option for SMEs
- Prosus agrees to acquire Indian payments giant BillDesk for $4.7 billion
- Central banks to develop prototypes for cross-border CBDC settlement
- ANZ, Citi, HSBC and Standard Chartered in the running for MAS digital currency prize
- Regulators and financial institutions in APAC waking up to Digital Asset opportunities
- Which are the best European FinTechs to work for in 2021?
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...