Future

I’ve just been reading McKinsey’s latest piece about the AI-powered bank. It reads like a polite consulting report, but underneath it is a fairly brutal critique of the entire banking industry because what they’re really saying – without saying it – is that most banks are structurally incapable of benefiting from AI. It not because…

The Bloomsbury Intelligence and Security Institute (BISI) produced a document yesterday about the risk of cryptocurrency to democracy . Seriously? Cryptocurrency is a libertarian dream that gives all of us a democratic vote. What risk is there? Well, let’s dig into the detail as this is not about “innovation in payments” or “the future of…

I always love looking back to the past for predictions of the future. From The Jetsons flying car to the communicator in Star Trek, there are so many examples of science fiction, much of which has become science fact. Just look at SpaceX’s reusable rockets or the Artemis II crew flying around the moon, and…

I’ve just read the regulatory roadmap that the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority released this week and realised that it is less a neat plan and more a recognition that the current system is broken and we’ve run out of road with Open Banking. For the past decade, Open Banking has been the poster child of…

I just had an interesting podcast conversation about stablecoins, Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) and tokenised deposits. Most people in finance think they understand the differences, but it’s worth pausing for a moment, because the distinctions really matter. At a very simple level: stablecoins are privately issued digital tokens (think USDC or Tether) backed by…

It was interesting that, last week, US regulators called an urgent meeting with the CEOs of the largest banks last Thursday, after the emergence of a new AI model from Anthropic called Claude Mythos. The reason wasn’t hype – it was capability. This model appears able to identify deep vulnerabilities in widely used software and…

I’ve been inundated with reports about stablecoins lately, and they all say the same thing … but in very different ways. So let me try and cut through the noise. Stablecoins are for wholesale commercial banking and trading today. They are not for the likes of you and me. But that will change. Let’s narrow…

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…

I use a variety of sites like Coinbase and IG for investing but find them very cumbersome. Trying to find how to sell and get rid of assets is not easy, unless you do it often. Here’s my vision of the near-term future. Money, investing, saving, trading will be just like Siri and Alex. “Coinbase,…

I wonder what my kids will feel in a financial future of 2050 and beyond. We will probably regale them with stories about using cheques and cash and paper to exchange value. They will probably be amazed that such systems worked, but it’s a bit like me being amazed about how tally sticks worked a…