The Fintech Times THE WORLD’S FINTECH NEWSPAPER

September, 2016

• 29 September

  The 2nd Fintech Investing Seminar launches

  

  The time has arrived. With the 2nd Fintech Investing Conference dating closer and closer, you wouldn’t not want to have your hands on tickets. Attendees from across the globe will be flying to the capital to be involved. With over 40 presenting companies, this event would be imperative to learn …

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• 27 September

  Opportunity Network’s Business Matchmaking Platform Is Expanding Rapidly

  

  One of the key selling points for Opportunity Network is digital symbiosis. Opportunity Network, an exclusive online business matchmaking platform for global CEOs, this week entered into major partnerships with Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO), the largest global CEO network, and Caixabank, Spain’s third-largest lender by market value. The new partnerships …

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• 23 September

  US Venture Capital Firms Back London Tech Companies Post-Brexit

  

  London ranks as Europe’s leading destination for technology and financial services, and is the best city in which to build a European operation according to a post-Brexit survey of over two hundred senior US tech executives. Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, will announce the findings today in New York during his …

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• 22 September

  DueCourse secures £6.25m investment

  

  DueCourse, the cloud-based invoice financing service for SMEs, has secured £6.25 million of investment in its latest round of funding; the largest investment seen outside of London for a FinTech company. The round includes £1.25m of equity and £5m of debt for lending to UK SMEs. New backers include the …

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• 21 September

  Crowdfest – festival of crowdfunding

  

  Crowdfunding is undoubtedly popular, helping companies innovate financially. Crowdfest is your opportunity to get involved, and learn how crowd funding can transform your business strategy. Whilst learning how to transform your company using crowdfunding, simultaneously, Crowdfest will give you the opportunity to network with everybody around you.  So, why Crowdfest? …

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• 20 September

  London Set To Host World’s First ‘Fintech For Good Summit’, Organised By Finca International And Rainmaker Foundation

  

  This month, London is set to host the world’s first FinTech for Good Summit, welcoming global leaders from the technology, finance, charity and the NGO sector to discuss the impact that financial technology can have in the developing world. The invite-only summit will provide a place to discuss how financial …

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• 20 September

  Psst…Did you hear about your right to reduced tax bills?

  

  Ever wondered what you are entitled to as a company, in terms of funding? You now have the opportunity to be rewarded for your innovation with a reduced tax bill or the chance to claim payable cash credit as a proportion of your R&D expenditure. We are reaching out to you, …

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• 20 September

  Luup selects Contego’s identity verification and fraud reduction platform to carry out complex AML and KYC checks

  

  Contego, the multi-source fraud reduction platform, today announced that Luup, a leading provider of merchant services for internet and e-commerce businesses, specialising in cross-border payments, has selected Contego’s platform to carry out checks on companies and individuals based in the UK, Europe and North America. This will help ensure compliance …

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• 16 September

  The Fintech Landscape

  

  FinTech is so prevalent in the modern financial services and technology sectors. So, what are some of the best performing FinTech sectors and what could the future hold for the space? Lending In the past, personal or business loans would be issued by traditional financial institution. This caused large financial …

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• 16 September

  Next Money London – At A Glance

  

  On a steaming hot day, 200 people piled into the Truman Brewery’s Boiler House. Warm winds of change are coming to the UK’s financial services, among the sources of this is surely the Leveche from Madrid. BBVA’s dominance of the progressive end of Europe’s Tier 1 banking world has not …

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• 9 September

  Scalable Capital targets further growth with launch of Stock & Shares ISA

  

  Scalable Capital, the European digital investment manager, is launching an ISA wrapper for its UK clients on 12 September. Under the new product, current and future clients will be able to access tax-free returns from investments with Scalable Capital for up to £15,240 for the 2016/17 tax year. In parallel …

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• 7 September

  Robo-advice tech, a ‘nightmare’ for FinTech

  

  Gilbert Van Roon, chief executive officer of Fintech Compliance, believes that chasing the robo-advice dream can be a regulatory nightmare for financial technology entrepreneurs. Picture a world where the first thing you hear each morning is the voice of Siri calmly informing you that your investment portfolio has increased by …

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• 2 September

  The UK’s Annual Overdraft Penalty Charges Of £1bn Are All Set To Disappear

  

  2016 could very well mark the beginning of the end for unplanned overdraft fees. This would be good news for those who fall foul of these charges but not for UK banks that earn over £1bn/yr from them. The reason I’m forecasting this is because the advent of Open Banking …

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August, 2016

• 31 August

  How I improved Co-op Banks security without getting dressed and still couldn’t get satisfaction.

  

  It’s half ten, I’m working from home, an 0345 number comes up on my phone, I answer. Me: Hello. Bank: It’s Nancy* from the Co op bank, can I speak to Mr XYZ** please? Me: That’s me. Bank: Thank you, before I continue, I do need to ask some security …

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• 31 August

  Krzana to the rescue!

  

  When a fire broke out at Motiva Enterprises’ oil refinery in Convent, Louisiana, there was more at stake than the safety of the 300 workers located there. Within seconds, oil traders anticipating a prolonged halt in production drove the price of motor fuel products soaring. But the first news of …

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• 24 August

  Blockchains & Procurement

  

  Blockchain tech is the term poised to define our generation. As opposed to Brexit or Trump — which is definitely not a bad thing! But what are blockchains? How do they work, in plain English and zero jargon? A Blockchain is essentially a data record. It is a shared, secure record of …

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• 23 August

  3 ways fintech will solve the GDP growth problem and why central banks should double down on fintech

  

  Since the 2008 crisis Central Banks from developed economies have pumped in over $7 trillion into the global economy. They have left interest rates at ridiculously low levels around 0% (and below 0%. This has further pumped in over $10 trillion into the economy. In fact you are now getting …

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• 18 August

  Startup of the Month: Future Start Technology

  

  What does Future Start Technology do? Future Start Technology is revolutionising and democratising investment management. The company’s mission is to give access to investment management and financial advice to anyone, regardless of their amount of money or knowledge of finance. In order for them to achieve this goal, they are …

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• 17 August

  Israel: The rise of the fintech hybrid

  

  Special Counsel, Adv. Roy Keidar of Yigal Arnon & Co. Law Firm examines the rise of the Israeli fintech sector.  Israel is globally known as the ‘startup nation’, a small country that has developed a rich ecosystem in which thousands of startup companies are creating new and innovative technologies. What …

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• 16 August

  Time to make fintech small

  

  After Iceland had beaten England in the European Football Championship I was reminded of a Barclays TV-commercial from 2000 where Anthony Hopkins explains why ‘a big world needs a big bank’. It’s a great commercial, and even though it’s 16 years old and we have had two serious global crises …

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• 12 August

  Startup of the Month: AimBrain

  

  AimBrain, a next-generation biometrics engineering company, helps financial institutions easily, securely, and accurately authenticate their mobile banking users. AimBrain delivers advanced biometric technology to banks so they can stay ahead of mobile fraud through a secure and frictionless authentication experience. AimBrain is helping some of the world’s largest financial institutions …

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• 11 August

  Startup of the Month: MOO.LA

  

  Moo.la is a digital investment manager. Its disruptive way of helping you manage and grow your money to take control of your savings and investments could represent the future of investing, and its value has been recognised by FinTech50 which ranked Moo.La in its top ten fintech companies. One of …

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• 10 August

  Startup of the Month: MONEY MOVER

  

  Money Mover brings cutting edge technology to cross-border payments. Its online foreign exchange and global payments platform provides a secure and low cost way for businesses to make international payments. In other words, Money Mover is targeting the $500bn that 5 million SMEs make in international payments every year. Money …

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• 9 August

  Startup of the Month: KANTOX

  

  Kantox is a multinational fintech company offering FX management solutions, and was founded in order to simplify the process of currency exchange with a transparent and easy-to-use tool. The expertise and products offered by Kantox allow its customers to manage their currency exposure, build hedging strategies, automate FX transactions and …

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• 8 August

  Startup of the Month: DARWINEX

  

  Darwinex is the revolutionary marketplace which bridges the gap between traders and investors. Using this online platform, traders get listed as a new asset class that investors, by backing the traders, can buy and sell. For traders to succeed, they need a chance to show their skills. But the closed …

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• 5 August

  Attacks against financial services firms rocket in 2016.

  

  Why is it happening, and what can be done about it? In 2016, financial services organisations have been under attack like never before, with a series of high profile data breaches that have rocked the global financial system. The February theft of $81m from the Bangladesh central bank was significant …

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• 4 August

  How to get investors chasing you, the owner of a Fintech Business

  

  According to a recent Accenture study, investment in fintech across the globe, continues to rise.  In the first quarter of 2016, investments in fintech reached $5.3 billion, a 67% increase over the same period the year before. However, the landscape of investment in fintech is changing.  Fintech startups are no …

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• 3 August

  Will London remain the capital of fintech?

  

  London is currently hailed as the global centre of fintech. This should come as no surprise, as it is by tradition a financial centre, with most of the leading banks operating in the European and African markets headquartered in the capital. Similarly, leading disrupting actors such as Funding Circle, Transferwise, …

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• 2 August

  Could robo-advisory technology break into the world of sports betting?

  

  “Wall Street” (CC BY 2.0) by  Dave Center  Analytics have become a vital part of the sporting world since the development of technology. Baseball was the pioneer sport to use statistics for team-building following the success of the Oakland Athletics in the infamous story of Moneyball. As a result, the system has been …

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• 1 August

  Translating Cyber-Threats into Business Risks

  

  Aside from the relentless barrage of cyber-attacks, one of the key challenges for IT security professionals is getting the rest of the business on board with efforts to keep these threats at bay. There is great potential for things to get lost in translation when cyber-threats and remedies for protecting …

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July, 2016

• 30 July

  Bricksave selects Contego’s fraud detection platform to carry out complex KYC and AML checks

  

  Contego, a multi-source fraud detection platform, today announced that the global real estate crowdfunding platform Bricksave has selected its platform to carry out international checks on individuals to ensure compliance with AML and KYC requirements. The property sector is an increasingly regulated market and complying with AML and KYC legislation is …

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• 29 July

  The Future of Fintech – with a bit of Brexit thrown in!

  

  I’m still in shock over the referendum result, but more about that later. According to the technologists we are all going to pay with thumbs, robots will make sure our pensions don’t shrink, realtime payments will be global and and it will be impossible to launder money… As a fully …

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• 28 July

  The Future of Fintech: William Mougayar

  

  The future of FinTech will include a continuous assault on the large incumbent players whose market shares are eroding. Large financial institutions are challenged, because they cannot innovate from within their current business models. They are happy improving themselves gradually, but are not able to make radical changes to their …

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• 26 July

  The Future of Fintech: iBe TSE

  

  I disagree that Apple, Google and other big corporations extending their tentacles into the fintech market should be viewed as a bad thing. They have a real affinity with startups and, within the years, they aligned culturally and crucially their view on fintechs as a necessary part of their business …

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• 25 July

  The Future of Fintech: REVOLUT

  

  Brexit was an outcome I think it’s fair to say that the majority of the UK fintech community was neither desiring or expecting, but whenever there is change and uncertainty, there is opportunity. Now that the dust is settling, it is time to take a dispassionate view and focus on …

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