Chris Skinner's blog

Shaping the future of finance

The Finanser’s Week: 5th September – 11th September 2022

The week’s major blog discussions include … To centralise or decentralise: that is the question [Part One] In what seems to be a series of posts, I’m going to hone in on the centralised versus decentralised view of the world. Here’s Part One! Thanks to my friend Dharmesh, I watched this 25 minute video from…

Centralised versus decentralised: I lost control (again) [Part Two]

When a central banker says the old system needs a regeneration, then something obviously has gone wrong. Swiss Re’s Chief Economist Jerome Haegeli stated that “we are in a crisis” in “slow motion” thanks to food, energy, and supply-chain shocks, in an interview last week. “You need crisis times for the shift in the macro regime”…

To centralise or decentralise: that is the question [Part One]

In what seems to be a series of posts, I’m going to hone in on the centralised versus decentralised view of the world. Here’s Part One! Thanks to my friend Dharmesh, I watched this 25 minute video from Coin Bureau the other day. The presenter is Guy Turner https://www.coinbureau.com/who-is-guy/ who is very articulate and credible….

Revolut’s auditing and AML controls raise questions

News broke on Monday that Revolut are under review, after their auditing was checked by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC), the regulator of auditors, accountants and actuaries. Revolut’s auditors are BDO and the FRC said that an unidentified “financial services provider” poor audit work had created an unacceptably high risk of errors. Sources have confirmed that the…

Developers: would you rather work for a bank or a fintech?

This video was dropped the other day by JPMorgan, encouraging young people good with technology to join the bank, instead of a fintech. In case you can’t watch it, here’s the argument. We have $12 billion to spend on tech JPM offers the same challenges as a Google with scale We’re the biggest bank in…

When crypto trading goes wrong

I find the world weird these days. Maybe it’s because I’m a grumpy old man. The flakiness ranges from schemes that are obviously trash to doing extreme activities that my father and grandfather would never have done. Examples? Skydiving, hanging off skyscrapers, diving with sharks, standing by gorillas and such like. Strangely, I’ve done all…

The Finanser’s Week: 29th August – 4th September 2022

This week’s main blog discussions include … Insuring Hell on Earth So for now this is the last of the guest blogs by Dr. Gail Bradbrook, the co-Founder of Extinction Rebellion. I do hope you have enjoyed something of the challenge, passion and alternative ways of seeing things that Gail has brought (find the others…

“Hello” exclusive! Chris Skinner visits a bank branch

I grew up with Mills & Boon, where old ladies wrote sexy stories about men on horses who would rip off the bodice of a young woman and deliver his sword. These days it seems to be Hello! that fills this vacuum, with Princess Kate flying on an economy flight and described as such: Who…

Insuring Hell on Earth

So for now this is the last of the guest blogs by Dr. Gail Bradbrook, the co-Founder of Extinction Rebellion. I do hope you have enjoyed something of the challenge, passion and alternative ways of seeing things that Gail has brought (find the others here). I invited Gail to contribute because I feel these difficult…

The art of farketing

A colleague at The Financial Times picked out this quote from William Burroughs … … and it piqued my thoughts. Burroughs was a huge inspiration to David Bowie, who is a huge inspiration to me. I’ve read Naked Lunch, where this quote was taken, but they used this quote in relation to ESG. The Naked Lunch author…