Grid

It was Earth Day on Monday, and a national holiday in many nations as they observed what Christians call Easter. Whilst Sri Lankans mourned the fatal losses on the Easter Sunday church gatherings, many observed the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970. One of the leading lights of the modern environmental…

The main blog headlines are … Will a global platform connect all of our money? When I talk about FinTech, I often reflect on the first time I encountered what I would, today, call a truly FinTech firm. It was on March 30, 2005, and a newly formed firm presented at the Financial Services Club…

When I talk about FinTech, I often reflect on the first time I encountered what I would, today, call a truly FinTech firm. It was on March 30, 2005, and a newly formed firm presented at the Financial Services Club an idea. The idea was to connect people with money to people who needed money…

I picked up an interesting article from Reuters, about how Asian technology firms are moving into banking in a different way to Europe or America. The article says that Amazon and Alphabet / Google are far more interested in serving banks with cloud and advertising, rather than competing with them, whereas Alibaba and Tencent have…

Someone said to me recently that most tech Unicorns are more like Leprechauns. A Leprechaun is also mythical and magical but, rather than delivering riches, it just promises riches at the end of a rainbow you never reach. In other words, most Unicorns are offering riches that are as mythical and magical as the beast…

The main blog headlines are … Leaving customers digitally high and dry … big mistake I’ve recently seen two blogs about issues with challenger banks N26 and Tandem. They both relate to the ways in which these new banks communicate, or not in these cases. Judith Bogner, a well-known and followed broadcaster, explains regarding N26…

I’ve recently seen two blogs about issues with challenger banks N26 and Tandem. They both relate to the ways in which these new banks communicate, or not in these cases. Judith Bogner, a well-known and followed broadcaster, explains regarding N26 and the fact that her husband was locked out of his account and so he…

I was once again reminded of the stupidity of passwords when locked out of yet another service that I use maybe once a year. When I decided to reset the password, once again my iPhone offered to set up a strong password that it would remember for me. Once again, I opted to not have…

Another key theme of the weekend conference was Brexit, best summed up by one panellist as a decision made by a confused population about an issue their politicians can’t agree with, don’t want to implement and has no support. As a result, Theresa May is trying to keep the Conservative Party together; please the European Union;…

During the weekend I presented the trends on FinTech and Tech Fin, my two favourite subjects. I’ll update on that shortly but I was also involved in a study the organisers – The European House Ambrosetti, a leading economics think tank based in Italy – conducted before the conference. The study looked at the bank…