Fintech

Aug 12, 2015

Does anyone really think banks aren’t aware of the Fintech challenge?

I find it interesting that so many bloggers on Fintech deride the banks for being slow, clueless or stupid. So many blogs talk about how banks don’t do this, don’t do that; fail at this, fail at that; have no idea, cannot change; are stuck in the past or have their heads up their arse. …

Aug 11, 2015

Do you believe in Unicorns?

It’s mid-summer and quiet, but there is some interesting stuff still happening, particularly when we talk about Unicorns. Do you believe in Unicorns? Unicorns, in technology terms, are companies with valuations of more than $1 billion that have launched since 2000. There are quite a few of them out there including Uber, Airbnb, Twitter, Whatsapp,…

Aug 5, 2015

Fintech innovation in Singapore: a hive of activity

I just attended a digital bank bootcamp in Singapore. It wasn’t much of a bootcamp. For example, I volunteered to play the Sergeant Major’s role and shout at the audience: “stand up, stand up, get your digital gear on and start delivering, you lazy lackadaisical wunch of bankers” … I was told that was not…

Jul 30, 2015

Fintech attacks whilst bank CxO’s snooze

Since asking a while ago who will be the Uber of banking, I’m fed up with everyone talking about the Uber of banking. For example, two headlines caught my eye this morning: Visa Invests in Stripe to Prep for the 'Uberization' of Retail; and Will Uber be the Uber of banking? Both stories are interesting, and demonstrate the…

Jul 29, 2015

The One Chart you Need to Understand Fintech

One of my good connections via social media is Huy Nguyen Trieu. Huy writes a regular blog at Disruptive Finance, as well as being a Managing Director for Macro Structuring at Citi. He posted something in the last week that I felt was worth re-posting here as a guest blog. The One Chart you Need to…

Jul 23, 2015

When everything is free, how do we make money?

I have this mantra in my presentations about payments. Payments is being attacked by Fintech startups like Klarna, Square, Stripe, Alipay, PayPal (Venmo, Braintree) and more. In fact, according to VentureScanner, it’s the second most active area for investors after lending (P2P and crowdfunding) … … and the most mature sector for new competition to traditional…

Jul 17, 2015

Is Fintech really so special? Maybe … or maybe not

So everyone’s excited about Fintech, but Fintech is nothing new. Fintech is actually pretty old. I could claim that if Fintech is about providing technology platforms to exchange finance, then that’s been around since banks first implemented technology platforms in the 1960s. In fact, I do claim that banks are Fintech companies. They are the…

Jul 13, 2015

The Finanser Interviews: Niklas Adalberth, Co-Founder, Deputy CEO and Board Member, Klarna

Following our regular weekly interview, the Finanser talks this week with one of Europe’s fastest growing unicorns, Klarna, in conversation with co-founder and Deputy CEO Niklas Adalberth, To begin with, perhaps you can tell me how you and your colleagues came up with the idea of Klarna. Sure. When we started this company, the entire…

Jul 9, 2015

The Fintech march into investment banking

One of the readers of the Finanser saw my write-up on asset and wealth management, and asked if I could talk about what’s happening in investment banking. Answer: yes, I can. It’s more difficult to see the Fintech stars and unicorns in the investment space however, as it’s more opaque having been disrupted by technology…

Jun 9, 2015

If banks are asking the wrong question, what’s the right one?

If asking what should we do about the Fintech disruption is the wrong question, what’s the right question? I would claim it is how can we change the bank to be a Fintech platform? A good illustration of this is HSBC and its past, present and future. Under John Bond, HSBC became a global financial behemoth, in the same…