I’ve just returned from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) where there were a number of events. Just a few weeks ago, I was in Bahrain, talking at a conference about FinTech as usual. What struck me is the interest and excitement about FinTech in both countries. There’s also a lot …
Read More »Western Union: is the future bright or dark?
I recently was hauled up over saying that Western Union (WU) was being disrupted by FinTech. The words that a reader took issue with are: The high fees of Western Union and other remittance providers were fairly punishing … until FinTech came along Western Union is being disrupted, to an …
Read More »Turkish delights in innovation
I’ve been working closely with BKM, the Turkish retail payments clearing company, for a few years now. They manage the Fintech Istanbul program, and are the powerhouse behind many of the innovations we’ve seen in Turkey from mobile wallets to contactless payments. Their CEO, Soner Canko, will be presenting to …
Read More »The largest payments company in the world that most people have never heard of
I blogged a year ago about TechFin, the incumbents’ view of applying technology to existing banking services, versus FinTech which seeks to transform the financial system. That has become one of the top search terms to find my blog, as it turns out, mainly because my blog entries are the first …
Read More »Will Apple Bank be the first new American #Fintech Bank?
On Wednesday the American Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC)* followed up on its promise last December to introduce a national bank charter for Fintech bank startups by issuing a white paper on how to apply for a licence, the evaluation process and what will be involved. It’s …
Read More »When will banks stop seeing financial inclusion as charity?
I was asked this question at a recent conference and yes, banks do believe that the mass poor are just that: poor. How do you make a profit out of the poor? Well, truth be told, the poorest are the most profitable. They’re the ones who need loans and go …
Read More »Counterparty payments in seconds is an easy sell
It made me laugh today. I was chairing a panel where Romana Kumar, Head of Global Transaction Banking for the National Bank of Abu Dhabi (NBAD), was discussing their trial of Ripple. The background to this was announced in a press release on 1st February 2017: Ripple’s Distributed Financial Technology …
Read More »Most thinking about poverty is wrong
There are basic human needs: food, drink, sleep … wifi. Once those are covered, everything else is supplemental. It’s not needed. It’s just stuff you want. If you can eat, drink and sleep comfortably, what else is there? I only ask this question because I was thinking about what we …
Read More »GAFA have already opened banks … just not in America
I heard a rumour the other day. The rumour goes something like: are you not surprised that banks grow into big beasts, as it’s government supported? Governments want banks to be big and regulated, because governments can then access the data the bank is keeping about their clients. IT’s access …
Read More »An interview with Tom Blomfield, co-founder of Monzo
The first job Tom Blomfield (left in photo) ever had was delivering leaflets for estate agent Wilson Heal. He lasted one day in the cold December rain before convincing the guys that leaflets were old school and they really needed a website, which Tom then built and still exists today. …
Read More »For Turkish bank Garanti: appiness is the truth
I recently started working with the guys at 11:FS. A great bunch of folks who really understand FinTech and Digital. So they have a podcast, a blog and even do some work sometimes. Anyways, I thought this article was interesting and so, in the spirit of sharing, have scraped over …
Read More »Laundering-as-a-Service (a bank USP)
I was surprised the other day when I met Pawel Kuskowski, CEO and Co-founder of Coinfirm, a start-up firm offering Compliance-as-a-Service. Pawel has been trained in compliance and AML, having worked with some of the world’s biggest financial institutions including AIG (Compliance Officer), UBS (Director of Compliance, Compliance and Operational …
Read More »The unbankable banked
Reflecting on the last year, it’s been crazy. I feel like I’ve spent most of the year jumping on and off airplanes. Most visited cities are London, for obvious reasons, and Singapore. I must have been there five or six times this year, and that reflects Singapore’s ambitions to be …
Read More »India’s idea about a cashless society is not the reality
I wrote a while ago about the amazing digital identity scheme in India called Aadhaar. It’s a card-based biometric scheme using a centralised database. Of course, today, they would have developed the scheme on a mobile wallet with a distributed ledger but hey, you can’t win them all. Some say …
Read More »China’s Fintech scene is a phenomena
When I was growing up, America was the superpower that we followed and Russia was in a Cold War. Today, there are two superpowers – America and China – and Russia is still in a bit of a Cold War that might be thawed by Donald Trump. So when it …
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