Chris Skinner's blog

Shaping the future of finance

Opinion

Fast cycle change: building a new world

I just had a nice holiday in Dubai. The hotel had a huge mixture of Asians, Russians, Indians, Europeans and even a few Americans. It was lovely. Geared up for families, there were rug rats and strollers everywhere. This got me thinking. Yet again, I was thinking how different these children’s lives will be to…

Half of banks’ customers don’t trust them

I was reflecting on this year’s Edelman Trust Monitor, a global survey of trust amongst consumers that has been running for 18 years. This year’s results prove fascinating, as there has been a slump in confidence in the media over the past year, due to fake news. However, the part that stood out for me…

#Brexit, Banking and Equivalence

As usual, the Financial Services Club was delighted to host David Doyle as our starting speaker for 2018, and he presented a fine overview of all the things bubbling as top  of the agenda in the European Union’s regulatory plans for 2018. Led by the Bulgarian presidency, the agenda focuses primarily on pushing forward the…

Bitcoin: More electricity consumption than the entire planet?

I am tempted to predict the price of bitcoin for the end of 2018 but know I’d be wrong, so I’m not. It could be $1 or $1 million. I’m not going to forecast it, as there are over 1,000 digital currencies out there and who knows which will be the winner long-term. However, one…

The driving force behind creating digital identity schemes

I’m often talking about digital identity and struggle with the subject. This is because the meeting of ID2020 I attended at the United Nations 18 months ago, talked about the issues of digital identity and poverty, and how the poorest are the most susceptible to human trafficking and slavery: How the system crushes the poor Most…

Future bank products are like jobs for your children

Banks need to make money on new products and services, from things that don’t exist yet, in the same way that children will need to find jobs that don’t exist yet. You may not have seen it, but it is estimated that two-thirds of the jobs of the future are yet to be created, and…

How will the world change in 2018?

I was asked by my speaker’s agency – Speakers Associates – to give some predictions for 2018. It was interesting to see that they did the same with six other speakers and so thought I would share all of our thoughts here today. How will the world change in 2018? Noreena Hertz Regarded as a…

The FinTech outlook for 2018

I usually start the new year by making some predictions, but so many others have been writing about 2018 trends that I’m not going to. There are four big things for 2018 from a FinTech viewpoint that are obvious to me however, which are: Getting down to business with Artificial Intelligence (AI): several of the…

The Top FinTech Trends of 2017 … were they?

The other forecasting I made at start of year concerned the big FinTech trends of 2017. Again, I thought it might be of interest to revisit them. Removing friction from the customer journey I guess this is a given, and wasn’t a big trend of 2017 … just a big trend of FinTech per se. Rise…