Payments

Building on my blog the other day about BLIK (the Polish digital wallet), I just got two really insightful pieces of analysis on European payments – talking of a payments vision – from PWC in a report on Europe’s open banking vision and Jeremy Light, a good friend formerly of Accenture, on EU wallets. Here’s the…

July 4 is always when my American friends give Britain the middle finger and proudly celebrate Paul Revere’s midnight ride that led to Independence Day on July 4, 1776. Great … but what about bank independence day? Most central banks, including the Federal Reserve, are independent of government control. Why and, more importantly, why is…

I’ve had a few things happen when making a payment. Sometimes to the wrong account; sometimes a fat finger 0; sometimes an issue with identifying the payee; etc. And the issue I run into is that the system does not accept questions about the payment I made. I cannot revoke a faster payment or a…

A few people got excited about Affirm working with Apple Pay to embed BNPL (buy now, pay later) in their services. As reported by CNBC: Apple device users will be able to tap into buy now, pay later loans from Affirm for purchases Affirm will surface as an option for Apple Pay users on iPhones…

I recently stumbled across an update of eIDAS. Have you heard of it, eIDAS2? It’s all about our digital identities in the European Union. The first eIDAS – short for electronic Identification, Authentication, and trust Services – tried to sort out all the ways to recognise who you are online. That first version was implemented…

A friend of mine was inspired by my aggregation discussions last week* to ask ChatGPT what they would do about it. The discussion was so good that I feel I have to share it so, here it goes: Anonymous I am researching Financial product and fintech product solutions that provide do good, positive financial wellness…

I got into a new debate yesterday, talking with two guys who are formerly with big card companies (shush, you know who), and we started debating the four-pillar model that’s been around for the last half century. The model is the basis of the card industry and involves acquiring merchants, issuing cards through banks, and then…

I recently wrote a white paper for XBP Europe, which you can download (see later). It’s all about how to be fit for the future and digital transformation, my usual subjects. Just to give a taste of the paper, here’s a small extract: The obvious answer is to digitise the corporation. The harder question is:…

For over twenty years, I’ve predicted the end of the ATM, cash and cards. Finally, many of those predictions appear to be coming true. It is certainly true of cash versus card … … and now it is turning out to be true for card versus wallet … Admittedly, the second picture is from a…

You may not have spotted it this week, but there has been a number of major strategic changes and moves by fintech leader Stripe. I’ve followed Stripe since their founding in 2010, and use them as a poster child of change in finance and technology, as demonstrated by their fast cycle growth from a company…