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Funnily enough, I posted that last piece “Competition: do you know what it is?”, and then realised the ambiguity of that title. Competition: do you know what it is? Sure we know what competition is. Competition is when someone threatens to take your business away from you. Competition is set by being better, faster, cheaper…

I’m involved in a meeting and conference focused upon the future of banking. This time it’s a question of the future of corporate banking, or commercial banking if you prefer. The world of treasurers and a conversation that always returns to the same old things around working capital, supply chains, procure-to-pay, payables and receivables and…

Nothing to do with the band, but much more to do with being constrained when it comes to innovation, a subject that is getting more and more focus amongst the Finanser community. In this instance, it's a survey on innovation in payments and banking, and repeats a survey from 2008. Back then, FSClub friend John…

Just to be clear, the word 'feck' in Ireland bears no relationship with the similar swear word used liberally by Gordon Ramsay. So why am I using this as a headline? Because the chap in the video below uses the latter word liberally to analyse the financial crisis from an Irishman's viewpoint (NSFW) … HT…

Banks are showing major profits again, bad debts are reducing fast, emerging markets are growing fast and bonuses are good, so all things are back to normal on the Good Ship Lollipop. Or are they? Not quite. Certainly profits are looking positive as Societe Generale, UBS, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs etc…

There’s this new phenomena emerging of high interest loans. For some people they are shocked by such developments. For me, it’s a natural thing. What am I talking about? Wonga, Quick Quid, Pay Day Bank, Wage Day Advance and more are all out there now, many of them advertising heavily on the box such as…

Last night we had a meeting of the Financial Services Club in Dublin. It was a good meeting, with a focus on cybercrime, but unusually for the Club one of the speakers collapsed half-way through the evening and an ambulance had to be called. He finished his speech, surprisingly, but had to do so seated….

The news that the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and the Canadian Stock Exchange TMX was rapidly followed by an announcement that NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Börse are also to merge. Equally, we’ve seen the Singapore Exchange SGX trying to acquire the Australian Exchange ASX, along with many other movements towards consolidation. I’m not going to…