After talking to 300 fintech CxO’s, here’s what we missed

I liked this article by Sergiy Fitsak on Finextra:

We Asked 300 Finance Leaders What’s Next in Fintech. Here’s What They Said.

His company, Softjourn, asked 300 fintech experts, CEOs and more on what’s hot in the fintech space these days. You can read the whole thing, but I’ll pick up some key headlines.

AI Is Moving From Noise to Utility

After years of pilot programs, AI has crossed a threshold. 85% of financial institutions now use AI for core operations, and the global AI in fintech market will hit $30 billion in 2025.

The aim is to get to a stage of delegated and embedded finance through AI algorithms.

Predictive Analytics That Actually Works

Predictive budget allocation using time-series forecasting sounds boring, but it’s where the actual money is. What does this mean?

“Everyone’s sitting on data from open banking, accounting, credit, and transactions, but most fintechs still treat AI as an analysis tool, not an execution layer. Whoever cracks that loop at scale will define the next wave of fintech.” Ciaran Burke, COO and Co-Founder of Swoop Funding 

Payment Infrastructure Just Got 99% Cheaper

Peter Connor, Co-Founder of BulletHQ, tells the story of how his team needed to send automated €1 payments to customers. Traditional banking rails would have cost €10,000 to onboard with a €2,000 monthly minimum. They found a platform offering the same capability through an API for €35 per month. “That was a whole section of the industry removed simply by the opening of that API,” Connor noted.

Transparency Is the New Area of Competition

“Explainability and trust are now the true obstacles. ‘Why was this borrower approved and that one declined?’ is no longer a technical question; it’s a reputational one.” Christopher Ledwidge, Co-Founder at theLender.com

Regulators Are Moving Faster Than You Think

“One regulatory shift that’s not getting enough attention is the coming AI model transparency and auditability requirement. Fintechs that can’t explain their algorithms may face compliance risks.” Gary Jain, CEO of The Ledger Labs

Embedded Finance Is Just Getting Started

The embedded finance market will reach $85.8 billion in 2025 and grow to $370.9 billion by 2035. But the numbers miss the strategic shift. Consider a SaaS accounting platform that offers business loans based on real-time cash flow data it already processes. Or an e-commerce marketplace that provides seller financing, payment processing, and working capital advances as built-in features.

The Generational Payment Divide

91% of Gen Z use mobile wallets, 93% use peer-to-peer platforms, and cash has fallen to just 7% of their preferred payment methods. [Ed: I note they don’t offer figures for millennials, Gen X and more]

In conclusion, it’s an interesting discussion and raises some critical points, but it also misses a whole raft of activity.

In particular, I was surprised there was no mention of cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, CBDCs, digital assets, tokenisation, blockchain and distributed ledger technology. Equally, what about quantum computing and where that’s going in terms of cybersecurity and encryption.

So, all in all, a nice report, but with serious gaps. Worth a read though.