Blog Index

This week’s main blog discussions include … It’s all about trust Building upon my blog about Revolut the other day, and their need for a banking license, I’ve been accused many times of coming back to a theme that you can only be a bank if you’re a bank with a license. Why do I…

This week’s main blog discussions include … There is no next big thing in banking I’ve been trying to think of the next big thing. Someone asked me on a conference call: what’s the next big thing? I’ve always been on top of the next big thing. Whether it’s the metaverse, AI, blockchain, cloud computing…

This week’s main blog discussions include … I just debanked my bank … before they debanked me There’s a huge furore in Britain about debanking: the process where a bank says we cannot trust you anymore so get lost. It happened to Nigel Farage, a high profile figure, and now it’s happened to me. What…

This week’s main blog discussions include … Am I financial marmite? At a conference the other day, a banker came up to me and said “oh, you’re that fintech guy who throws rocks at us all the time”. A short while later, a fintech founder came up to me and said “oh, you’re the banking…

This week’s main blog discussions include … Selling customer data – good or bad idea? Be careful with data Many years ago a few banks debated the idea of selling customer data to get a payback. It was the wrong decision – if you sell customer data, it should the customer who gets the payback,…

This week’s main blog discussion’s include … Is your chatbot compliant? Fifteen years ago, social media was becoming popular. Facebook was growing fast, and Twitter had just launched. Ten years ago, banks were cautious about such media as it might compromise customer information. Five years ago, many were starting to get the idea, but were…

This week’s main blog discussions include … Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the oldest bank in the world became the newest? I’m working with a cryptobank start-up, and we’re looking at options for licensing. Various countries have various attractions, with some more attractive than others. I won’t go into the nuances of the details as…

The main blog discussions this week include … The Dunning-Kruger effect, as inspired by a bank robbery I had never heard of the Dunning-Kruger effect until the other day. Inspired by a bank robbery, Professor David Dunning worked out that people sit at opposite ends of a spectrum of confidence. Some are hugely confident and…

This week’s main blog discussions include … How the Wirecard story unravelled: an interview with Dan McCrum who broke the truth I’ve been following Dan McCrum, the investigative journalist with The Financial Times, for quite a while. He’s the guy who broke the Wirecard story, even though it could have meant quite a lot of…

This week’s main blog discussions include … Introducing the Dimonsaur For the past decade, Jamie Dimon has regularly been decrying bitcoin as a scam. Here’s a few of his quotes: Jamie Dimon tells Davos that Bitcoin is a ‘pet rock’ that does nothing—except help with fraud and money laundering Jamie Dimon lashes out against crypto:…