Grid

For those who are fans of Black Mirror, I just got news of the forthcoming Netflix Series 7. As usual, it is a dark anti-tech futuristic vision, but I was particularly intrigued by the script of Episode 3: the Trust Token*. The theme is that, in the near future, as Earth globalises and integrates, we ditch…

After years of travelling the world, I find it interesting how countries differ. For example, having moved to Poland a few years ago, Polish people are not good at being arrogant. They are pretty humble, tbh. This means they are not good at marketing and selling in general. Sure, there are exceptions, but I find…

Whilst most banks are closing branches, JP Morgan Chase are opening new ones in the USA. Why? My LinkedIn friend Arcady Lapiro, CEO and founder of Agora, explains: Wondering where JPMorganChase Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon will be jet-setting in the next couple of weeks? Here’s a hint: think “Small Town, USA.” Kicking off today,…

I find it interesting that most reportage of fintech is very much B2C focused. We talk a lot about Stripe, Adyen and Klarna; we talk about A2A, P2P and PIS; we talk a lot about challenger banks and neobanks; we talk a lot about retail and consumer markets. We don’t talk so much about B2B…

This week’s main blog discussions include … Multisensory payments: is this the future? I just spotted a new innovation in India from Paytm, who I consider friends of mine after interviewing their founder, Vijay Shekhar Sharma for Digital Human a few years ago. What’s the innovation? Talking payments. The Paytm soundbox – which works both online and…

Did you ever get that SMS saying a delivery was attempted but failed, or an email stating that you need to confirm details for a delivery or an in-app message to say ‘approve this’? These are the primary ways in which scammers are targeting consumers to give their bank information voluntarily, when it is not…

I just spotted a new innovation in India from Paytm, who I consider friends of mine after interviewing their founder, Vijay Shekhar Sharma for Digital Human a few years ago. What’s the innovation? Talking payments. The Paytm soundbox – which works both online and offline with QR codes – allows merchants and customers to hear their transactions…

In a long feature, Bloomberg describes how Donald Trump has become a crypto fan. Trump Bitcoin 2024: How NFTs Made Him a Crypto Cheerleader – Bloomberg My reading: it’s based on his vanity. The cryptoworld created a whole range of NFT trading cards of Trump a few years ago and, because it made a lot…

I just found an interesting blog by Plaid: 10 fintech trends for 2024 that define the industry’s future What are the 10 fintech trends? Trend #1: Consumers will use more fintech apps than ever Trend #2: Fintech increasingly provides financial stability during uncertain times Trend #3: Emerging payment technologies will become as normalized as the…

I just found an interesting report about the big tech trends of tomorrow, written by McKinsey. They have identified fifteen things to follow, as shown below. Not sure I would agree with all of them but, for any CIO or investor out there, it could be useful for you to know. You can download their…