Blog Index

This week’s main blog notes include … Banks waste billions on digital How much money is wasted by banks on digital? I wonder whether, one day, anyone will work out how much money has been wasted by banks on digital technologies. Various reports reckon that banks spend anything from half a trillion dollars a year…

The main blog discussions this week include … CBDCs, the Digital Euro and how it might work I’m very aware that central banks are investigating the use of digital currencies, particularly as they can now see bitcoin gaining more and more traction (Tesla, Square and more committed – next is Apple?), but had not realised…

The main blog discussions this week include … Singapore-on-the-Thames? Welcome to the new London … [Kalifa Review] In the midst of Brexit plans and a Covid pandemic, the UK Government launched a FinTech review chaired by Ron Kalifa. I’ve met Ron at a few conferences, when he was CEO and then Chairman of WorldPay and…

The main blog discussions this week include … The youngsters bucking up the stock markets (that’s bucking with a ‘b’) I was pretty surprised to find that many of Robinhood’s account holders are very young, with an average age of 31. It is probably why they pile into anti-Wall Street stock movements and they are…

The main blog discussions this week include … Breaking the stranglehold of banking Someone asked me to elaborate on the links between banks, government, the economy and society, and this was well illustrated by the video I shared the other day of James Pierpont Morgan, who founded the JPMorgan empire (see end of this blog…

The main blog discussions this week include … Omniaccess is the strategic imperative for the 2020s During the summer and autumn of 2020, I ran an online survey of banks and FinTech firms around their view of physical versus digital access to banking. Obviously, in 2020, digital access to accounts has come to the fore…

The main blog discussions this week include … What’s going on with Crypto? A year ago, I invested $1,000 in bitcoin. Today, that’s worth $10,000. OK, I made those figures up. I actually invested and have invested and keep investing in bitcoin and, more importantly, ether – the currency of Ethereum – in which I…

The main blog discussions this week include … Happy New Year 2021! Here’s what’s going to happen … After a year where every day felt like Groundhog day – same shit, different day (SSDD) – I’m hoping that 2021 will be different – different shit, every day (DSED). I’m not complaining, but 2020 was pretty…

These are the top 11 most read blogs of 2020 … unsurprisingly, they are mainly about digital transformation and the biggest challengers out there: Monzo, Starling, Revolut, Ant and company; although this year’s #1 will surprise you as it’s nothing to do with finance and technology. Enjoy!   At #11 Forget about Monzo and Starling,…

The main blog discussions this week include … Can we change The System? Yes, we can … ish I woke up yesterday to find this story on Sifted, the Financial Times newish platform dedicated to innovation and FinTech: Fintechs to cosy up with politicians to counter ‘big bank lobby’ It’s interesting, especially for a guy…