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The Finanser’s Week: 4th September – 9th September 2012

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Our biggest stories of the past week are ... 

 
I spent some time contemplating history last week, and realised just how many times we have been through moments like this. The Civil War in Britain; the storming of the Bastille in France; the Russian Revolution; the themes of many...
 
 
I went to see a screening of a new film about Anonymous last night called We Are Legion: the Story of the Hacktivists. The film tells the story about the rise of Anonymous and the hacktivism movement, portrayed through interviews...
 
 
During the week, I’ve been discussing various aspects of risk and riot in the system, from the potential for an uprising to how anonymous works. One of the key areas to consider is where all this goes in the future and it is likely that someone, maybe Julian Assange, becomes a new zealot leader ...
 
 
Whilst consumers are electing the next major political leader via crowdsourced populism, governments and companies begin developing cyberarms. This cyberwarfare is already rife, with a host of malware targeting middle eastern nations (see end of blog entry). What is obvious...

The real challenge for the banking system is how to protect their firewalls from attack by hacktivists, goverworms and cybercriminals and, conversely, how to deliver easy access to online banking for their clients and customers. It’s a real dilemma. On...

 

The major general news stories of the past week include ...

Monitise
concerned by how City values tech sector
- The Independent

Monitise,
the fast-growing British mobile payments company, yesterday raised fresh fears
about London as a place for tech companies to raise money and claimed it was holding
back valuations compared with US rivals. 

PwC
to investigate computer meltdown at RBS
- The Telegraph

PricewaterhouseCoopers
has been chosen to investigate the computer meltdown that affected millions if
RBS customers. 

FSA
'asks banks for IT contingency plans'
- The Telegraph

Britain's
financial regulator has sent letters to the nine largest banks and building
societies in the UK requesting details of their IT contingency plans, according
to reports.

Nomura
to cut costs by $1bn following insider trading scandal
- The Telegraph

Nomura is
to cut $1bn (£630m) in costs as part of a bid to repair its balance sheet as
Japan's biggest brokerage recovers from an embarrassing insider trading
scandal.

OTC
traders agree electronic protocol
- Financial Times

Banks and
brokers sign up to common computer language as they create new networks to
comply with global regulatory overhaul of the market

UK
executives struggle with regulation
- Financial Times

Survey
reveals executives at UK financial firms are spending significantly more time
keeping up to date with rapidly changing regulation

Jump
in number of bank complaints
- BBC

Complaints
made about British banks - including ones related to the mis-selling of payment
protection insurance - soar, new figures show. 

RBS
discloses new head of retail was awarded £3.2m 'golden hello'
- The
Telegraph

Royal Bank
of Scotland has awarded Ross McEwan, the new head of its retail division, a
£3.2m "golden hello" to help convince him to join the
state-controlled bank.

Banking
revolution planned for high street
- The Telegraph

The
traditional bank branch and manager could become a thing of the past under
proposals set out by a leading financial services industry consultant.

New
Barclays head quits NBNK board
- The Independent

Sir David
Walker, the new chairman of Barclays, has stepped down from the board of NBNK,
the vehicle which tried and failed to buy 600-plus branches from Lloyds Banking
Group.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the Complete Banker Series

 

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Chris Skinner Author Avatar

Chris M Skinner

Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...

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