Chris Skinner's blog

Shaping the future of finance

Technology

Mobile payments is so hot right now, it burns

I said that I had been chairing a conference on payments last week. The conference is the International Payments Summit, one of my annual favourites. It now has quite a wide ranging remit, from SEPA and European payments through all things electronic to mobile. With more time, I would write up every session, as there…

Ostrich-head-in-sand

Mobile payments is so hot right now, it burns

I said that I had been chairing a conference on payments last week. The conference is the International Payments Summit, one of my annual favourites. It now has quite a wide ranging remit, from SEPA and European payments through all things electronic to mobile. With more time, I would write up every session, as there…

Ostrich-head-in-sand

Contactless payments are already past their sell-by date

Spent most of this week at a payments conference. The theme was relentlessly around mobile payments, as this area of the market has truly kicked off as a major focal point for banks, telecommunications firms, retailers and merchants. There was a particularly interesting debate about contactless payments, as this is also something that is being…

Square Card Case

Anonymous: dangerous or laughable?

We have seen a great deal of activity from the activist online community called Anonymous in the last year. They first hit my radar when they closed down the websites of PayPal, Visa and MasterCard in retaliation for the arrest of Julian Assange and closure of Wikileaks funding accounts. This resulted in a co-ordinated Distributed Denial…

191590-occupy-anonymous

Anonymous: dangerous or laughable?

We have seen a great deal of activity from the activist online community called Anonymous in the last year. They first hit my radar when they closed down the websites of PayPal, Visa and MasterCard in retaliation for the arrest of Julian Assange and closure of Wikileaks funding accounts. This resulted in a co-ordinated Distributed Denial…

191590-occupy-anonymous

Mobile banking – getting there, but not there yet

Just found an interesting survey of American banks mobile offerings. The survey polled 14 top American banks for their mobile services: Bank of America, BB&T, Capital One, Chase, Citibank, Citizens, Fifth Third, ING Direct, KeyBank, PNC Bank, Regions, SunTrust, TD Bank, U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo. Chase are placed in poll position, with Wells Fargo…

Mobile banking – getting there, but not there yet

Just found an interesting survey of American banks mobile offerings. The survey polled 14 top American banks for their mobile services: Bank of America, BB&T, Capital One, Chase, Citibank, Citizens, Fifth Third, ING Direct, KeyBank, PNC Bank, Regions, SunTrust, TD Bank, U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo. Chase are placed in poll position, with Wells Fargo…

A crowdsourced bank mobile app

Today, I read a few headlines that make me sit up and take note. First, the news that China’s just bursting over a billion mobile users.  Yes, China is a big economy with 1.3 billion citizens.  A billion mobile users is big news as it means that almost all Chinese citizens now have access to…

Square

A crowdsourced bank mobile app

Today, I read a few headlines that make me sit up and take note. First, the news that China’s just bursting over a billion mobile users.  Yes, China is a big economy with 1.3 billion citizens.  A billion mobile users is big news as it means that almost all Chinese citizens now have access to…

Square

US authorities start campaign against Bitcoin?

Several people pinged me yesterday to highlight the fact that Bitcoin has now become a target of the major payments processors. Not for acquisition. Not for partnership. Not for joint ventures. Not for support. No. Bitcoin is obviously becoming a threat to mainstream operations as it is now an active shut-down target. This was demonstrated…

Vanonymous