Fintech

I was talking to an insider friend in the Revolut empire yesterday and he implied that Revolut is in talks to acquire a major Asian bank in its expansion across the region. I asked him which bank? but he kept schtum. So, I was thinking about it and wondered if it could be DBS? DBS operates…

Short summary: Tokenization is not new, but dates back 10,000 years when early societies used clay tokens to record ownership of goods. These were not money, but data tools to track value. Modern digital tokens and blockchain systems are simply the latest evolution, but can now do more than just record transactions. We can now…

I was recently watching Dragon’s Den (Shark Tank if you’re American), and spotted an interesting chap – Jinesh Vohra, founder of Sprive, a way of getting your mortgage paid down sooner through your spending. It’s an intriguing idea, so I reached out to him for a chat. Here’s what happened. Chris Skinner: Tell me a…

I was just having a chat with an AI engine asking about the most common questions people ask about cryptocurrencies. Really interesting answer so, I thought I would share it here (with my edits), as I’d be really interested in your views and answers. Equally, I’m tempted to say that this should be a test…

A couple of things hit my radar late last week. The first was a prediction by Bain & Co that challenger banks would own a third of the UK banking market by 2030. This coincided with the news of Revolut finally getting their UK banking licence. It’s only taken five years. Let’s dive in. The…

The next era of payments: when money moves at internet speed I just found an interesting report by KPMG about a new payment standard called x402. Have you heard of it? If you haven’t, it’s built to ensure open, free, frictionless payments, and could be revolutionary for embedded, invisible finance. Built by Coinbase, the x402 protocol…

Innovation vs Illicit Finance: Why the Future of Crypto Compliance is Intelligent The US Treasury just produced an interesting document about digital assets, innovation and criminal activity. It’s well worht a read, so download the report here … but, if you can’t be bothered, here is my view. There is a familiar pattern whenever a new…

I probably shouldn’t say this so, if I get arrested, please send money and help me but, over ten years ago, I told Russian and Iranian contacts to put all their money into bitcoin and cryptocurrencies to avoid sanctions. Yes, it’s my fault. I’m sure there are others out there, but the key thing about…

I just did a webinar sponsored by Xpand IT. Here is a summary: From Physical to Digital to Intelligent: The Third Revolution of Finance Let me start with a simple question. How many of you think we’re living through a period of unprecedented change in finance? We’re not living through change. We’re living through a…