The UK’s City regulator will work with Japan on fintech startup collaboration March 9, 2017 The City watchdog is searching beyond Europe for fintech ties after Brexit and has its sights set on Japan for its latest bridge. The Financial Conduct Authority and it counterpart in Japan, the Financial Services Agency of Japan (JFSA), will work together on promoting fintech innovation and collaboration. But the agreement also means that UK fintechs [...]
Fintech funding trends in 2017 March 6, 2017 An Innovate Finance report recently suggested that venture capital investments into the UK FinTech sector have dropped by a third over the past year, potentially making way for a new type of investor in town. FinTech has typically attracted the most investment and limelight compared to other areas of digital innovation. Yet the funding landscape [...]
Atom Bank secures £113m in new funding for app-only lender February 28, 2017 App-only Atom Bank has succeeded in raising more money as part of a £250m funding round, as it races to secure market share in the newest front in the battle for banking customers. The fintech start-up will receive £113m in investments from Spanish bank BBVA, as well as investment funds Toscafund and Woodford Investment Management, [...]
Blockchain for banks is a “long way off” says influential central banker February 27, 2017 Blockchain fintech has a “long way to go” to satisfy financial regulators, according to an influential board member of the European Central Bank (ECB). Benoit Coeure said the underlying distributed ledger technology could pose new risks to the financial system, including legal and operational obstacles. Coeure said: “Distributed technology could become a game-changer for payment, [...]
Access to finance is key to getting SMEs exporting February 27, 2017 Brexit may have been delayed but one thing that isn’t slowing down is UK exports. The latest industrial trends survey published by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) this month revealed that export orders remain above the long-run average. But while big businesses are reaping the benefits of exporting, small and medium-sized firms are being [...]
Philip Hammond enlists Mark Carney and Simon Kirby for first UK FinTech conference February 26, 2017 The government will host its first ever International FinTech conference as part of FinTech Week 2017, chancellor Philip Hammond announced today. City minister Simon Kirby and Bank of England governor Mark Carney will join the chancellor at the conference, which will feature panels and workshops as well as opportunities for UK FinTech firms to pitch [...]
Regulators welcome fintech but aren’t sure what to do with it February 23, 2017 | City Talk Regulators have a 'wait and see' attitude about regulating fintech. Two governmental organisations recently released reports on regulatory approaches to fintech advances, including blockchain. First, the US Federal Reserve Board released its report on distributed ledger technology (i.e., blockchain) in payments, clearing, and settlement. Following that release, the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) — a joint [...]
How Blockchain technology will change the financial services industry February 20, 2017 | City Talk Blockchain technology has been hailed as a potential “second generation of the Internet.” A whole vocabulary has sprung up around it, with an emphasis on key words like distributed ledger, cryptography, and trust. But what is blockchain, exactly? It’s basically a database where recorded transactions are copied to a participating network of computers. Since the [...]
It’s time to turn to fintech to solve the late payment problem February 17, 2017 The UK is a nation built on small businesses, with SMEs accounting for a staggering 99 per cent of all businesses in the private sector. While many of these businesses thrive, a significant number suffer as a result of late payment, impacting their ability to invest and ultimately grow. Late payment is a chronic problem for [...]
Meet Prodigy Finance: The fintech firm that went global on day one February 14, 2017 With Trump in the White House and a hard Brexit on the horizon, protectionism is back on the menu. Many entrepreneurs are concerned about the implications for the free movement of goods, capital and people. But at a recent Leap 100 breakfast, chief executive and co-founder of Prodigy Finance, Cameron Stevens, sounded a note of [...]