Peer-to-peer lender Zopa narrows losses despite revenue growth slowdown October 4, 2018 Peer-to-peer lending platform Zopa narrowed its losses while investing heavily into its impending digital banking effort last year, as it chases the coattails of freshly-listed rival Funding Circle. In accounts published late last night, Zopa Group, the parent of its online lending and financial services businesses, reduced its losses to £4.2m for the financial year [...]
Should financial professionals learn data science? October 4, 2018 | City Talk When many financial professionals are asked about the importance of learning programming languages, they usually respond with answers that imply such tools are only beneficial for IT or Development teams. They believe that learning such languages will provide little to no benefits to them because, after all, they have teams who can do that for [...]
German digital bank N26 backed by Tencent and Peter Thiel launches in the UK October 4, 2018 A German digital bank backed by Tencent, Li Ka-shing and Peter Thiel will launch in the UK today with the aim of taking on the big high street banks and adding to the fierce competition among British app-only banks. N26, which already counts 1.5m customers across 17 European countries, has started rolling out its banking [...]
Funding Circle shares fall over 20 per cent on first day of trading October 3, 2018 London fintech hopeful Funding Circle took a hammering on its first day of trading on the London Stock Exchange today, falling at one point more than 24 per cent below its initial price target. Shares in the peer-to-peer lender fell as low as 334.5p in mid-morning trading, down from its listing price of 440p. Read more: Funding Circle [...]
How London can fend off the European hotspots vying for its fintech crown October 1, 2018 Flash back to the immediate aftermath of the Brexit vote. “London has committed suicide as a leading fintech centre,” tweeted Traxpay, a German payments platform. Catchy advertising urged startups to “keep calm and move to Berlin”. Read more: Meet the startups in the Treasury-backed Tech Nation fintech accelerator Over two years later, and it’s French [...]
RBS’ new digital bank to be called Bo September 27, 2018 Royal Bank of Scotland is understood to be exploring the launch of a digital-only standalone consumer bank, which will go live under the name Bo. Charging forward with RBS’ former operations chief Mark Bailie at the helm, roughly 100 staff are thought to have been briefed on the project’s name, sources told Sky News. [...]
Revolut to bid for fresh European licence as it reveals losses September 24, 2018 Fintech powerhouse Revolut has revealed its post-Brexit strategy amid the publication of its 2017 financial accounts, which put a heavy spotlight on the banking app’s operational losses. Primarily, a spokesperson for the London startup confirmed to City A.M. it had applied for a second e-money licence in Luxembourg, in addition to its 2017 application for a [...]
Regulator calls in Paypal’s $2.2bn iZettle merger on day it completes September 20, 2018 The UK's competition regulator has called in Paypal's $2.2bn (£1.7bn) acquisition of Swedish payments firm iZettle on the day it completes. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) will investigate whether the merger would lessen competition between payment platforms in the UK, with the firms remaining separate until the CMA concludes its probe. Nevertheless, Paypal said the [...]
Regulator calls in Paypal’s $2.2bn iZettle merger on day it completes September 20, 2018 The UK's competition regulator has called in Paypal's $2.2bn (£1.7bn) acquisition of Swedish payments firm iZettle on the day it completes. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) will investigate whether the merger would lessen competition between payment platforms in the UK, with the firms remaining separate until the CMA concludes its probe. Nevertheless, Paypal said the [...]
We speak to the head of Zopa about the FCA’s credit clampdown and how to survive another financial crisis September 13, 2018 In the grand scheme of financial services, the peer-to-peer lending industry is young. With the sector now in its early teens, it’s this immaturity that often seems to spark questions about resilience, particularly how peer-to-peer companies would cope during another economic downturn. Those in defence of the industry tend to use Zopa as an example: a [...]