Fintech

A key part of UN’s agenda for sustainability is the taskforce for digital financing. Officially launched in November 2018, around the same time as the UN’s Principles for Responsible Banking, the taskforce is specifically tasked by the Secretary General of the UN to look at how the financial system and …

I thought I would share my speech at last week’s UN meeting and the short version is summarised nicely by the UN’s press page: Chris Skinner, an author and commentator from the United Kingdom, discussed the promise of “fintech” — which integrates finance and technology — to extend financial services …

Due to various connections, I was asked to deliver the opening keynote speech at the United Nations High Level Political Forum last week (some coverage here). It was one of those rare occasions where I got nervous, looking out at the faces of dignitaries from nations all over the world. …

A lot of discussion at the United Nations, where I’ve been all week (blogging about that next week), has raised the question of Libra, the Facebook digital currency. I’m avoiding calling it a cryptocurrency, as it’s more a stablecoin that is focused upon transactions, which is why it has Visa, …

A few years ago, I posted a guest article from Philippe Gelis, co-founder and CEO of FX firm Kantox, on Why FinTech Banks will rule the world. It was very popular and made my top ten posts of 2015, and Philippe has been kind enough to let me share another …

No, I don’t mean Attention Deficit Disorder, which would be ADD, but I mean Artificially Intelligent with Dumb Data. Now, I know I moan on and on about fragmented legacy systems, but I honestly have no idea how a bank could ever be able to compete with an Apple or …

I was talking to a Securitisation conference the other day. Securitisation? What’s that? Well, I could explain but if you don’t know google it and you’ll find it’s one of those areas of financial markets that destroyed economies a decade ago and left us all with a huge debt. Well, …

I’ve been involved in finance and technology for a long, long time. Originally, I was a technologist; then a financial technologist; and now a FinTech guy. However, I see the FinTech piece as being irrelevant. Whether it’s FinTech or TechFin, it’s all still just finance and technology. The difference is …

I was having an interesting conversation with a guy who had joined a big bank having previously worked in Big Tech. The guy was headhunted by the bank to be a gamechanger (GC), and had been gifted the ability to do almost whatever he wanted when it came to innovation, …

Talking of partnering, many years ago, I was assigned the role of negotiating a contract with a partner for a large technology firm. The partner specialised in the insurance markets, my focus at that time, and we got into the game of contract wording. For quite a while, it was …

I encounter lots of banter about platforms, marketplaces and ecosystems, and do wonder in the flippant way people use them interchangeably whether they really understand what they are talking about. I’m sure many do but I’m also sure some people throw them into the conversation like a buzzword bingo game. …

Over ten years ago, I started blogging about cloud computing and financial services. Many banks dismissed the idea back then as “the regulator wouldn’t allow it”. Then the regulator did allow it in some countries, but banks were confused about the regulatory position. For example, if they use cloud services …

Following on from Facebook’s announcement of its own digital currency Libra, the key regulatory body of banking – the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) – which sets standards like the Basel capital reserve requirements, has stepped into the debate and produced a report on their view of the threat and …

Looking at the world of the future, we all wonder what will happen to work. Will we still have jobs? Will all the dumb jobs disappear so we no longer have call centres (replaced by chatbots and avatars); accountants and auditors (replaced by AI algorithms); Uber drivers and hotel check-in …

I’ve blogged a few times about Facebook planning to launch a currency … Will Facebook become the world’s central bank? If Facebook launch a cryptocurrency, will US government shut it down? … and the fact that most regulators won’t like it. In fact, there are already questions being asked in …