Blog Index

This fortnight’s blogging musings include … Arguments for and against CeFi [Part One] Russell Brand had a big rant against Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) the other day, claiming that digital, programmable money combined with a digital identity is a fantastic way for governments to place you in a digital straitjacket. Are fiat currencies dead?…

The main blog discussions this week include … The constantly evolving Ant As those who have picked up my recent books, you will know that I’m an avid observer of Ant Group and Alipay’s activities. After all, the company did become a 30,000 word case study in my book Digital Human. I haven’t written about Alipay…

The main blog discussions this week include … Are you real or fake? I watched the recent series Capture on the BBC where real-time images can be distorted and changed. This moves from CCTV images to live television. It’s all about deep fake technology where a person can appear to be ‘live’, when it’s just a fiction….

This week’s main blog discussions included … The FinTech Bloodbath Back in January, I called 2022 the Big Regression for FinTech. Ten months later, sure enough, it is. Daily headlines about losses and layoffs are gathering non-stop, and storm clouds are gathering fast to demand market change through consolidation and merger. FinTech London’s double bloodbath…

This week’s main blog discussions included … The top technologies for banks now and next year Two big consulting firms just released interesting reports about technology trends: McKinsey and Bain. McKinsey’s report focuses upon the technologies that matter most, and found 14! As usual, being consultants, they had to put them into a complex chart….

The main blog discussions this week include … Sell when everyone is buying; buy when everyone is selling The world has reached a bit of a weird place. For years, the only way was up. Suddenly, it all seems like it is down. In fact, it seems to have gone off the rails and, in…

The main blog discussions this week include … CeFi, DeFi? No, it’s HyFi with WiFi! Growing up hi-fi was High Fidelity, the best way to hear music. In 2022, HyFi is hybrid finance, the best way to use money. HyFi combines CeFi with DeFi. I don’t believe you can just have one. DeFi works for…

This week’s main blog discussions include … If finance was a football team I had this strange dream the other night where I wondered what a financial institution would look like as a football team. Sure, it’s a weird thing to dream about, but it made sense, so I woke up and wrote down the…

This week’s main blog discussions include: Skandal! starts tonight on Netflix: the story of Wirecard Skandal! starts tonight on Netflix What’s all that about? It’s all about Wirecard and the investigative journalism of one Dan McCrum, a friend who reported on the affair with The Financial Times. Over time, Dan’s work resulted in proving that…

The week’s major blog discussions include … To centralise or decentralise: that is the question [Part One] In what seems to be a series of posts, I’m going to hone in on the centralised versus decentralised view of the world. Here’s Part One! Thanks to my friend Dharmesh, I watched this 25 minute video from…