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I just had an interesting discussion with a banking colleague who has been investing in start-ups.  He said that many of the firms begin with a belief that they will succeed because they are not a bank. A business strategy based upon attracting consumers by not being a bank, is not sustainable. Once they find…

As David Cameron negotiates a new EU contract in Brussels today, the UK referendum on a Brexit takes place during the summer, with some saying as early as June 23rd.  There’s a YES campaign to stay in the Union and a NO campaign to get out., with the question being: ‘Should the United Kingdom remain a…

There’s been a large number of white papers produced recently about Fintech and Blockchain, so I decided to collate the most notable ones here.  All links are to file downloads and if I’ve missed any, please let me know. Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System (9 pages, October 2008) The origins of the whole thing in…

I don’t get to use the word Kaleidoscope often, so finding this excellent Infographic that includes me and a few friends, gives me the chance to throw it into the blog for a change.  After all, this Infographic provides a veritable Kaleidoscope of Fintech. As we all know, Fintech is everywhere. Spanning everything from payments,…

Our main stories of this week includes … Is it Fintech or Techfin (Part One) In conversation with bankers and start-ups, it is clear that there is a differing view of the world.  It is not as clear-cut as nimble innovator versus dinosaur incumbent, which is how many portray this chasm of difference of thinking, but…

It’s amazing what you stumble across on the internet. I was looking for some bank news the other day, when all of a sudden cropped up this clip from the 1940 film The Bank Dick (Detective) with the famous drinking actor W. C. Fields. I’m posting it partly because the head of the bank is a…

I was going to write a long wordy reflection on this year’s Finovate, which took place over the last two days in London, but was beaten to it by Benjamin Ensor and Oliwia Berdak of Forrester so, rather than writing my own view, here’s theirs: Finovate 2016: Automation And Personalization Take Centre Stage By Benjamin…

I’ve been presenting the idea for a while now that banks are not being disrupted or unbundled, as so many claim. It’s a nice idea but completely misunderstood.  The disruption idea assumes that banks will let it happen, are not awake, will not respond, can’t respond, don’t care and couldn’t be bothered.  The unbundling idea…

Few of us can forget the terrible attack on Paris in November.  When the Paris attacks took place at the end of last year, I was lucky enough to visit Paris a couple of days later for the annual CARTES conference event. Some firms had pulled out last minute for fear of further attacks, but…

In part one, I talked about the views of the Fintech start-ups who begin with thinking: how can I transform this financial process using technology?  Banks think differently and begin with thinking: how can I apply technology to this financial process?  The core difference is that banks think Techfin rather than Fintech.  They begin with…