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I’m often talking about Victorian visions of the future to illustrate the issue we have today. The Victorian vision of the future was dealing with a number of problems, one of which was horse shit. Manure. Manure was a massive issue.   Victorian Britain had too many horses and carriages on the streets, and the horses…

I know many of my twitter followers have seen this news already, but here’s the official announcement of the partnership we are creating with Life.SREDA in Singapore. SINGAPORE-BASED LIFE.SREDA LAUNCHES $100 MILLION BLOCKCHAIN INVESTMENT FUND LONDON, APRIL 18 2016 Life.SREDA, a venture capital fund based in Singapore, has partnered with financial expert and fintech specialist…

Our main stories of this week includes … Marketplace lending comes of age One of the interviewees in my new book ValueWeb is Ron Suber, President of Prosper Marketplace Lending. Ron gave a speech last week which is summarized below. Well worth a read. Markeplace Lending: Evolution of an Asset Class (The following post is excerpted from a…

One of the interviewees in my new book ValueWeb is Ron Suber, President of Prosper Marketplace Lending. Ron gave a speech last week which is summarized below. Well worth a read. Marketplace Lending: Evolution of an Asset Class (The following post is excerpted from a keynoted speech I gave at the 2016 LendIt USA conference) Over…

I had a lovely conversation with a group of investment bankers last night about technology transformation in capital markets. During the opening, a consistent theme cropped up: standards, interoperability, collaboration and cooperation … or lack of it. It is interesting that, in the buy and sell side world, few standards have worked except for FIX…

I just had a really interesting, off-the-record, discussion with a banker. Can’t give too much detail therefore, but here’s how the conversation went: “So, what’s it like working for MegaRetailBank?” “Shocking”, he said. “They are completely branch focused. Here’s an illustration. They launched a new retail bank subsidiary in a country in 2008. That country…

Those of you who know me, know that I hate the word channel and any adjunct that goes with it. This is because channel shows a lack of digital depth, as it’s just sticking something on top of the old architecture or lipstick on a pig if you prefer. It doesn’t work. I have other…

We had a fascinating chat about digital identities at the Innovate Finance Global Summit (#ifgs2016) today. It was a private roundtable with members of government, central banks, the banking and Fintech community and commentators/observers. Listening to the dialogue going to and fro, I realised that this is one nut that’s too tough to crack. Here’s…

Our main stories of this week includes … Challenger versus incumbent or challenger and incumbent I guess my highlight of #Money2020Europe was moderating a discussion between Martin Blessing, CEO of Commerzbank, and Ricky Knox, CEO of UK digital-first start-up Tandem Bank. What does it take to be a FinTech hub? As mentioned I’ve just attended #Money2020Europe…

I guess my highlight of #Money2020Europe was moderating a discussion between Martin Blessing, CEO of Commerzbank, and Ricky Knox, CEO of UK digital-first start-up Tandem Bank. Really interesting back ‘n forth between ceos of Commerze Bank and Tandem Bank. #Money2020Europe pic.twitter.com/TsPmwXXUOd — Kristian Luoma (@kluoma) April 6, 2016 We had a fascinating dialogue before the…