Talking about job losses in the City reminded me of a comment a colleague made: "if we had delivered on all the headcount savings our bank has been promised from technology change, we would not have any staff in this bank anymore". Interesting and, during our conversation, I followed up with: "we never get the…
After the announcement last week of job losses at Barclays, I was reflecting on this and two other news headlines. One from Reuters states that the boom time for trading has gone whilst the other, from the Financial Times, shows that traders are no longer what banks are looking for – instead they're hiring computer programmers. The…
Building upon yesterday’s blog about the Medici’s and the close relationship between religion and finance, there’s another close relationship that needs to be noted: finance and art. Obviously, artists cannot flourish without some benefactor and all the greatest art of history has been financed by Emperors, Kings, Dukes and bankers. However, it was the Medici’s…
Building upon yesterday’s blog about the Medici’s and the close relationship between religion and finance, there’s another close relationship that needs to be noted: finance and art. Obviously, artists cannot flourish without some benefactor and all the greatest art of history has been financed by Emperors, Kings, Dukes and bankers. However, it was the Medici’s…
Apparently Facebook has applied for an e-money licence in Europe, according to today’s Financial Times. That’s no big deal, as Google and PayPal have had bank licences since the mid-2000s in order to operate e-money capabilities. It hasn’t meant that Google and PayPal intend to be banks, although they might in the future. It does…
Apparently Facebook has applied for an e-money licence in Europe, according to today’s Financial Times. That’s no big deal, as Google and PayPal have had bank licences since the mid-2000s in order to operate e-money capabilities. It hasn’t meant that Google and PayPal intend to be banks, although they might in the future. It does…
A week before Zopa luancheed in Britain in 2005 one of the co-founders, the now late and much missed Richard Duvall, presented the concept to the Financial Services Club. Richard Duvall, Founder, Zopa from Chris Skinner No-one really understood it at the time although now, it makes great sense. An eBay for money. Those who…
I received one interesting comment about Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon (GAFA) and co getting into banking from one bank: why would they? His response was based upon the fact that he’s more worried about Google when they’re not a bank than when they are one. “If they bought a bank – let’s say they…
I was amazed to see the news this morning that Alibaba, the Chinese equivalent of eBay and PayPal, has acquired China Union Pay. This is fantastical news and builds upon the recent announcement that Alibaba will get into banking. From Breaking Views: Alibaba isn’t a bank. But for customers it’s getting hard to tell the…
We had another great launch meeting of the Financial Services Club in Slovakia last week. As with Norway, this was at the Ambassador’s Residence of the British Embassy, although the Bratislava Residence is very different to the Oslo one (read more at the end of this blog entry if interested). The focus of the meeting…
