Opinion

If banks are like oil, build better vehicles

I bet Venessa didn’t realise what she had started when she had her rant the other day, but I’m enjoying the thought process started by Venessa’s reactions to SIBOS, my reactions back and the reactions of the community reading these entries in their commentary and thoughts. In fact the commentary is great, and I appreciate…

Where banks and socials can agree

I said I would respond to Venessa’s rant in a bit more detail, as she deserves a response and not just a pat on the head to say: “there, there”, which is what she implies most banking folks have done so far. Before I get into that, it’s interesting to see the reaction to yesterday’s…

Why banks and socials agree to disagree

SIBOS sparked two big conversations this year. Two separate conversations both targeted at fundamentally changing financial thinking. The first was the Long Now, which was all about how to invest for the long-term health of our planet. I’ve talked about that enough for the moment. The other conversation has been bubbling on twitter, and is…

Cloud Computing: looking for erogenous zones at work

So yesterday was an outsourcing day. Or rather it was a virtualisation and cloud computing day. Or isn’t that the same thing? Funnily enough, it was at a conference focused upon government issues in technology and information security, with lots of discussions about identity, secure email, information storage and data security best practices. On the…

The Distance Divide

You may think this blog title sounds familiar . It should be as it combines two key themes from the 2000s: the Death of Distance and the Digital Divide. One argues that technology has connected us all globally and overcomes distance which changes business models; the other argues that there are those who get digital…

The Long Blog about the Long Now

Much of last week was focused on the Long Now and Long Finance for me. Working with a group of thought leaders that included Venessa Miemis, Thierry Touchais, John Hagel, Stefan Nusser, Michael Mainelli, Paul Saffo, Bruce Davis, Brett King, Nova Spivack and more, we debated big topic items all week. And yes, there were…

Big Questions

Innovation has nothing to with technology

It intrigues me how often we have a conversation about innovation, and everyone starts talking about new technology. “Oh, have you seen our iPad app, it’s really hot.” “Sorry, but our Android apps beat that hands down, and Android is hot today.” “Yea, Android is hot today but forget all of those things. You need…

Can we confidently create ways of investing for the long-term?

A fifth big question for the session I’m running at SIBOS, focused upon Long Finance, is whether there is any way to create a system that allows all of us to confidently invest for the long-term? In case you missed the other four were: When will we know there won't be another meltdown? Who will…

Which nation will be next global superpower?

As mentioned the other day, we are asking some big ticket long-term questions at SIBOS this year, such as: When will we know that financial systems work? How will we know when financial risk is not an issue anymore? What will America and Europe be doing when the economic power balance has shifted to Asia?…

MiFID II: the post-trade agenda

One of the big topics in capital markets is intra-day liquidity and post-trade transparency. Such discussions are far more noticeable now because the whole reason for this crisis, according to some, was the loss of trust between counterparties. That loss of trust was based upon counterparties not having enough liquidity to cover their positions. After…

Liquidiry Risk