Why Fintechs won't replace traditional banking

There’s been a lot of talk about whether traditional banks can survive the digital revolution. Industry experts have mused about the fate of brick-and-mortar banks as the pandemic fueled a shift toward digital options, but is the assessment that traditional banks are destined to disappear a fair one?

Find out more and read the full article HERE. 

How does lending work? - Decoding: Banks - Episode 4

From 11:FS. Lending has been around for thousands of years and is one of the cornerstones of banking. Although ledgers aren't made out of clay anymore, the principles have largely stayed the same. Curious to know more about lending? We get into how it works and what's in it for the banks.

How do card networks operate? - Decoding: Banks - Episode 3

From 11:FS. Mastercard and Visa are the two biggest credit card networks in the world. But what is a card network? How did they begin? How do they operate?

What are payments rails? - Decoding: Banks - Episode 2

From 11:FS. Ever wanted to know what’s going on behind the scenes every time we make a payment? We break down what a payments rail actually is, the different types, and why achieving real time payments is so difficult.

Fintech Africa

"Africa is leading a FinTech revolution that many have not seen or noticed. It has unicorns and funding that has increased nine times in just the last five years to a value of $5 billion in 2021, and that is double the amount of 2020" .... so writes Chris Skinner in his Blog.

He continues ... "When you mention Africa, some people think it is a country full of famine and war. First, it is not a country but a continent and yes, there is some famine and war, but that’s not Africa. Before the pandemic, I travelled to many countries in the region and had amazing experiences in Kenya, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and more. Now, I am so pleased to report that from early seeds, trees have grown."

Read his full blog-post HERE and find out what Africa is doing and what Africa has achieved in the fintech world. 

How has the banking battlefield evolved? - Decoding: Banks - Episode 1

11 FS kicks off their Decoding: Banks series with a look at the banking landscape today and how we got here. Over the course of the episode, we look at some of the fundamentals - what is money, what is a bank and how has the banking ecosystem today taken shape? We'll also look at how rival players have changed the game and what the future might hold. Let's get started.

Where Banks & Credit Unions Are Missing the Mark with Mobile Banking

Consumers expect more out of mobile apps than a glorified debit card and checkbook register. Their raised expectations uncover gaps in the quality of major financial institutions' apps in comparison with fintech apps, new research reveals.

Even the best of the best among the mobile banking apps of large financial institutions are doing only “C level” work compared to where they need to be. They are especially lagging in the digital money management functions that have made fintech and neobank apps so popular, according to a major consumer study by Insider Intelligence.

Get the details from The Financial Brand HERE. 

What Trends Are Going To Transform Business Banking in 2022 and Beyond?

Financial institutions are especially vulnerable to losing small-to-medium sized businesses to fintech entrants.

SMBs have typically been underserved when it comes to tech innovation or new digital services. More than six in ten businesses in this large segment go outside their primary bank for business services such as payments and receivables.

An innovation revolution is roiling business banking just as it has consumer banking.

When it comes to sleek new tech and shiny new digital products and features, much of the innovation has long been focused on the consumer side of banking. Business banking, meanwhile, remains stuck in neutral, saddled with legacy tech and processes, many of which are still largely paper-based.

But banks that can ramp up their game when it comes to business banking services stand a good chance of getting a leg up on competitors and driving revenue. Individuals that use business banking services are, after all, consumers as well, and increasingly they are demanding the same type of innovation they get in their consumer lives from their business banking relationship.

So, what trends are going to transform business banking in 2022 and beyond that?

Find out by reading the report from The Financial Brand HERE. 

How to keep innovation moving

Managing the risks and rewards of emerging technologies is a tricky balancing act. How is it possible to maximise the upsides of innovation while minimizing the potential downsides? Read more here: https://econ.st/327bXxU

How to Build Blockchain Financial Services Applications

Are you a start-up founder or an enterprise leader with plans to launch a financial services application? You might be wondering whether, and indeed, how to use blockchain for this.

Industry observers highlight the steady growth of blockchain in the financial services market.

A Markets and Markets report states that the FinTech blockchain market will grow from $0.23 billion in 2017 to $6.2882 billion by 2023. The report projects a CAGR of 75.9% during the 2018-2023 period.

You are no doubt wondering how to build blockchain financial services applications?  Find out how, HERE.

 

Is ‘Buy Now, Pay Later’ the Future of Consumer Lending?

Major specialists like Klarna, Afterpay and Affirm, as well as payments giant PayPal, are raking in big bucks financing consumer purchases. They are playing a different game than many banks and credit unions. But amid this tectonic shift there may be opportunity for traditional institutions — in part by picking up the pieces.

That buy now, pay later purchasing is booming is indisputable. It’s a story that’s been building up over the course of the last several years. Predictions that it would surge to new heights during the 2021 holiday shopping season were supported when PayPal CEO Dan Schulman, appearing on CNBC, crowed that on Black Friday, “our volume on buy now, pay later was up almost 400% year over year.”

Schulman added that his company’s “Pay in Four” installment plans proved to be “one of the stars, actually, of the holiday season for us.”

Want to find out more? Click HERE.

 

Neobanking: Pros, Cons, and How to use them Efficiently for your Business

 

Neobank is a term for banks that exist only in digital form, as an app, web app, or other software solution, and doesn’t have any physical branches. It can work in several jurisdictions and is usually not limited to a single country or region.

In 2020, the number of e-commerce transactions made with digital or mobile wallets reached roughly 45 percent and by 2024 this number is expected to be over 50 percent. 

What does it have to do with neobanks or EMIs? Read the full article HERE.

Digital Services that Changed the Face of Banking

The convenience and speed of digital banking services are at a point of no return. Here’s a look at some innovations in fintech and banking that make our money lives easier. 

Banks have always been at the forefront of the digitization revolution. Internet banking became a reality as early as the 1990s. Mobile banking was possible by the early 2000s. The last two decades have seen several digital innovations that have made banking more accessible to customers. Fintech apps and platforms have just added to the convenience of customers.

The COVID pandemic has given a push to the banking ecosystem to rapidly embrace digitization. We take a look at the digital technologies that have transformed the way we bank.

Read the full article HERE.

 

Kenya Looks to FinTech, Credit Union Convergence to Advance Growth

Credit unions have served as a financial backbone to millions of households in Africa for decades, with some 39,000 organizations across the continent providing small installment loans and credit lines. Now, the industry is embracing technology to accelerate growth and bring about expanded financial inclusion.

The savings and credit cooperative organization (SACCO) sector in Africa is aggressively stepping up its digitalization efforts to not only drive financial inclusion to the last mile, but ensure that underserved consumers have access to financial services that had been previously unavailable to them or hard to obtain.

The Kenyan FinTech Kwara, founded in 2018 by Cynthia Wandia and David Hwan, was developed to help the unbanked and underbanked build wealth in a frictionless way. Kwara also strives to assist credit unions in East Africa transition to digital platforms.

Read the full story on PAYMENTS. com - click HERE.

Marc Winitz, CMO at Rapyd, on the fast-paced payments industry

On this week's episode of Spotlight Mariette Ferreira is joined by Marc Winitz - CMO at payments fintech Rapyd. The pair dive into Marc's career, his role at Rapyd and what the team there are working on, before taking a look at the wider payments industry - one of the most exciting areas of financial services. 

 

Monetary Authority of Singapore Kicks off FinTech Festival

Sopnendu Mohanty, chief fintech officer of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, shares the central bank's ambitions to become a global fintech and crypto hub. This year's Singapore FinTech Festival that is taking place this week will focus on "Web 3.0." Mohanty speaks with Haidi Stroud-Watts and Shery Ahn on "Bloomberg Daybreak: Asia."

 

“TOP READS OF THE WEEK” (for week 30 October to 5 November)

This is the final edition of TOP READS OF THE WEEK in this format.

However, you can still get all the top reads in banking, fintech, payments, cybersecurity, AI, IoT, risk management by reading / subscribing to the “Citadel Advantage News Digest”.

The Citadel Advantage News Digest is published at least twice a week with all the latest news on Banking, Fintech, Payments, Operations Risk and much, much more. Check it out!

Subscribe to our newsletter click HERE. Under the topmost item “Newsletter” click on “Start reading” to access.

In this weeks selection;

Top Reads

• Meta CEO Zuckerberg predicts the metaverse will be mainstream in 5-10 years
• Banks' green pledges under scrutiny
• What We Can Learn From The Sub-Saharan African FinTech Infrastructure
• Sorry, Mark. You Don't Own the Metaverse
• Starling CEO says open banking a flop: Other fintech chiefs beg to differ
• Citi makes COVID-19 vaccine mandatory for 65,000 US employees
• Regulator previews coming crypto, stablecoin policy
• Fintech Apps Still Depend on Old-School Banks to Move Money
• A Battle for Earth: 5 Ways IoT Can Help Save Our Planet
• Elon Musks Lessons In Business Scaling
• The advantages of an AI/ML-enabled search engine for FDA records
• UK regulators warn financial sector still failing to account for key climate risks
• Protecting The United States' Critical Infrastructure From Cyberattacks
• Global rule maker created for ESG disclosure standards
• Pandora Papers highlight the importance of PEP checks as part of AML armoury

From our Blog

• The Great Resignation: Why Millions Of Workers Are Quitting
• Facebook Name Change Signals High-Stakes Race for 'Metaverse'
• China's Race for AI Supremacy
• Understanding and Responding to Bribery & Corruption Red Flags
• See what three degrees of global warming looks like
• The Cost to Reduce Global Warming? $131 Trillion Is One Answer

Fintech is only 1% finished

Fintech is only 1% finished. But what do we mean by that? 

Simon Taylor, Head of Ventures at 11:FS takes us through the landscape of financial technology in this Lightboard edition of 11:FS Explores. When you take a look at the customer numbers that financial services brands are serving in any particular segment, it’s apparent that the majority of UK Fintech brands currently operate within areas that have high customer numbers, but low value-per-customer. 

For example, areas with high customer numbers such as retail are being served by market-leaders such as Monzo, Starling, and Revolut. Retail is one of the most over-served markets by digital banking providers at the moment - but considering 12 million UK customers have a digital bank and the majority aren’t moving their salary into it, there is still a lot of work to be done, and that shows it. But the biggest edge in recent times is the massive changes to the supplier landscape - from onboarding and KYC, to payments, to Banking as a Service. 

Prospective fintech companies now have the chance to assess the opportunity space for their proposition and to get a full view of the suppliers available to them. With such a robust supplier landscape emerging - it means that any company can be a fintech company. The market has blown wide open.

“TOP READS OF THE WEEK” (for week ending 22 October)

This week’s top reads in banking, fintech, payments, cybersecurity, AI, IoT, risk management and much more

In this weeks selection;

Top Reads

• What is Google FLoC and How Does It Affect Your Privacy
• Facebook's Novi launches digital currency wallet pilot
• Is ethical banking a thing?
• 4 Women-led Crypto Projects That Are Driving the Blockchain Industry
• Broadcom Software's Symantec Threat Hunter Team discovers first-of-its-kind ransomware
• SEC Revives Proposal to Claw Back Executive Pay
• The surge of fintech in South America
• Forensics Monitoring Is Blockchain’s New Sheriff
• Essential Aspects of Cloud Compliance for Financial Services
• Amex will let employees work wherever they want one month a year
• Supply-Crunch Inflation Gives Central Banks an Unfixable Problem
• Treasury goes into damage control on bank data reporting
• Ransomware summit takeaways: Pledges to disrupt safe havens, money laundering
• No profit worries? Earnings week still served up drama
• What Emerging American Legislation Means for Crypto Assets and CBDCs
• Deutsche Bank’s ESG executive slams industry’s greenwashing practices
• These are the top 10 tech trends that will shape the coming decade, according to McKinsey
• 8 security and risk management trends to watch: Gartner
• Is PayPal pining for Pinterest?
• 3 Reasons Financial Institutions Can't Let Mergers Stall Innovation

From our Blog

• Three ways to make better decisions - by thinking like a computer
• China’s Silicon Valley is Hiding a $30 Billion Fortune
• How to Plan and Implement an Ethics & Compliance Risk Assessment Program
• Podcast “American Kleptocracy”
• China's Xi Dials Back Economic Overhaul
• Is China's economic model broken?

“TOP READS OF THE WEEK” (for week ending 15 October)

This week’s top reads in banking, fintech, payments, cybersecurity, AI, IoT, risk management and much more

In this weeks selection;

Top Reads

• Analysts pin Google retail bank U-turn on fears of higher regulatory scrutiny, low profitability
• JPMorgan Chase joins UN's Net-Zero Banking Alliance
• Why Chatbots Fail in Banking
• We may visit you at home, British financial watchdog warns bank staff
• SocGen to Cut 3,700 Jobs as Part of Domestic Retail Merger
• Crypto Could be in Trouble after China Declares all Crypto Transactions Illegal
• Two Key Digital Payments Trends in the Post-COVID World
• Capgemini’s World Payments Report 2021
• Are NFTs a Money Laundering Gold Mine?
• From tech tool to business asset: How banks are using B2B APIs to fuel growth
• Will massive outage set back Facebook's payments plans?
• 15% minimum global corporate tax faces obstacles: Tax Foundation
• U.S. SEC opens inquiry into Wall Street banks' staff communications -sources
• What's next for banks that partnered with Google now that the tech giant has scrapped its checking-account push
• How to Explain NFTs to People Who Think Theyre Just JPEGs
• Is Apple Pay Secure? - Platform Security and Privacy Overview
• DeFi Glossary 2021: Pretend You Know What is Going on
• AI Is No Match for the Quirks of Human Intelligence
• Credit-card firms are becoming reluctant regulators of the web
• Cyberattack on Ukraine grid: here's how it worked and perhaps why it was done
• Analysts pin Google retail bank U-turn on fears of higher regulatory scrutiny, low profitability
• IoT: Beyond Alexa
• ISO 20022 just one of the key steps towards cross-border payments interoperability
• PayPal takes stake in Latam SPAC

From our Blog

• How to Plan and Implement an Ethics & Compliance Risk Assessment Program
• Bitcoin Miners Tap Hydropower as Environmental Criticism Grows - WSJ
• Podcast “American Kleptocracy”
• Malinvestments, When Your Eyes Are Bigger Than Your Stomach
• Evergrande Woes Spread to China’s $12 Trillion Local Market
• 3 Major Questions Around Evergrande's Debt And China's Economy That Remain Unanswered