The European Central Bank (ECB) has just issued a report on Virtual Currency Schemes, with case studies on Second Life and Bitcoin (both previously covered in depth here). In the report, the ECB calls Bitcoin “the most successful — and probably most controversial — virtual currency scheme to date.” The ECB goes on to say that the…
Andrew Vorster, Vice President of R&D and Adam Banks, Chief Technology Officer for Visa Europe delivered a fascinating double act at the Financial Services Club the other night. The theme of the presentation was: the future of payments and technology, and covered seven key trends that Andrew and Adam have identified that will disrupt payments:…
We had a great debate at the Financial Services Club last night, picking up on that perennial debating point: do banks need branches? In the pro-branch corner were Anthony Thomson, co-founder of Metrobank and Ron Whatford, former Chief Experience Officer with Lloyds Banking Group; in the anti-branch corner were Mark Mullen, CEO of First Direct…
The world is a wonderful place, as times shift fast and things turn faster than an egg on a timer. Just as you get used to one technology, another comes along and turns things on its head. What technology do we mean? NFC. Near Field Communication. No Flippin' Chance. The more I think about NFC, the…
I’m speaking at a conference on the future of payments today for one of the world’s largest suppliers of payments terminals. They asked me my views on the future of the point-of-sale, and I said that it would disappear. Not a good position to take when you’re the keynote speaker at a conference for a…
Whilst consumers are electing the next major political leader via crowdsourced populism, governments and companies begin developing cyberarms. This cyberwarfare is already rife, with a host of malware targeting middle eastern nations (see end of blog entry). What is obvious from these developments is that cyberattacks are the new form of warfare that evades direct…
I spent some time contemplating history last week, and realised just how many times we have been through moments like this. The Civil War in Britain; the storming of the Bastille in France; the Russian Revolution; the themes of many German philosophers during the 1800s, such as Karl Marx and Friedrich Nietzsche; and more. Throughout…
