Future

There has been a lot of thinking and rethinking during 2018 about blockchain, cryptocurrencies, bitcoin and everything digital currency related. I wrote about the challenges getting blockchains implemented for example, and was surprised to find myself enduing up as a network meme. The power of the pundit, ay? Last year …

There are many pundits predicting change in banking and FinTech this year. Here’s a review of a few of the ones that have some depth. American Banker published seven FinTech predictions for 2019 by Bob Legters, Chief Product Officer of Banking and Payments at FIS. The seven headlines are: We won’t …

So yesterday, I gave you the top ten trends for 2019 from British Airways’ Business Life magazine. The article also discussed a range of other trends that are noteworthy, so here’s a quick summary of the other things to expect in 2019. 2019: The Year of the People This is …

Hello, hello and hello again. Welcome to 2019. A brand new, fresh, shiny year, and just out of the starting gate. Having said that, yes we are still talking Brexit and we still find a group of shady bankers knocking off billions. Same shit, different day, as Stephen King would say. …

I present regularly to retail, commercial and investment banks, wealth managers and fund managers, insurance companies and more about how technology is transforming everything. I often can feel a sense of cynicism in the room. We’ve heard all this before and yes, I’ve pointed this out several times: The boy …

I just gave a presentation on blockchain. I haven’t been asked to make a specific presentation on blockchain for over a year, so it meant dusting off some rusty notes and slides and thinking about where we are today. I know that last year, I spent most of the year …

The United Nations Principles for Responsible Banking were released last Monday. The aim is to help any bank – whatever its starting point – to align its business strategy with society’s goals. It’s a nice idea, but is it practical? In a guest column James Vaccaro, Director of Corporate Strategy at …

I’m likely to be blogging about leadership all this week, as that was the theme du jour of our Nordic Finance Innovation meetings in Copenhagen and Oslo last week. Saxo Bank, DNB, Danske Bank, Nordea and more were discussing the challenges of digital transformation and the leadership challenge, and I’ve …

I’m regularly asked why I don’t think banks are doing digital yet, and my answer consists of a series of steps. First, does the banks’ leadership team talk about digital, digital banking, digital investment and digital transformation? Invariably, all bank people tell me yes. OK, second, has the bank actually …

It’s a big week of FinTech in Asia with Money 2020 China and the Singapore FinTech Festival (SFF) all taking place in the same week. One of the headlines emerging from SFF was an interview with Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of Ripple. The headline is from a Bloomberg interview and reads: …

I often talk about teaching children to learn what machines cannot learn. Our system of education was created in the Industrial Revolution, and is based upon kids being stuffed with facts, stats and dates. They learn to parrot-fashion repeat things, and are tested to see if they can remember. It’s …

As I travel around, I find different cultures fascinating Some are open, some are closed; some are welcoming, some are distrusting; some feel comfortable, some feel weird; some feel nice, some feel strict; and so on. A lot of the feeling you have about a country is a mixture of …

Like many of us, I have several pet hates about banks. My main one is when they sting you with charges you don’t expect. I always remember getting a £50 charge for an unauthorised overdraft a few years ago. I’d been with the bank for over twenty years and never …

I keep seeing headlines about Amazon opening a bank, challenger banks pulling the crown off the incumbent banks heads, the end of old banks, the disruption of the system and the end of all traditional financial services. I guess some would say that I fall into this camp and, on …

I have one slight concern as we go cashless, having experienced it myself. You cannot go cashless if it does not include everyone. I had this experience in China. Arriving on a Sunday lunchtime at the Holiday Inn Express hotel, I successfully checked in and had a nice room with …