The Singapore FinTech Festival returned for its 7th edition on 31 October to 4 November 2022 bringing together more than 850 expert speakers and over 250 hours of content across its week-long programme.
Organised by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), SFF 2022’s theme of ‘Building Resilient Business Models amid Volatility and Change’ attracted participants from more than 110 countries and 2,000 organisations. It also housed more than 450 exhibitors and 25 international pavilions across the exhibition hall.
Singapore plays a huge role in the global fintech industry as a trusted hub for high growth and rapidly digitising Asian markets.
According to KPMG, as of June 2022, there are 1,007 operating fintech firms in Singapore. The number of fintech firms in Singapore remains the highest among SEA countries representing 67 per cent of the total across the region which numbered 1,482.
SFF 2022 Exhibition
For the first time, the Exhibition featured an ‘ESG FinTech Zone‘. Designed in partnership with MAS’ green fintech office, it hosted ESG fintechs, financial institutions, and real economy players to showcase solutions that meet key ESG data and disclosure challenges faced by companies.
SFF 2022 Conference
The Conference – opened by Lawrence Wong, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance – took place from 2 to 4 November. It served up over 400 sessions with government leaders, policymakers, innovators, economists, corporate leaders, and fintech entrepreneurs.
SFF 2022 Innovation Lab Crawl
Between 31 October and 1 November, 26 organisations, including Asia FinTech Center, Capgemini, NEC Laboratories, BNY Mellon, DBS and HSBC, showcased their latest fintech innovations across alternative investments, decentralised investments and insurance.
Sopnendu Mohanty, chief fintech officer of MAS, said: “The industry is on the cusp of moving into three areas – Web3, digital assets, and an ESG-focused economy. We designed SFF to reflect this shift in an open, engaging and bold way, focusing on finding solutions to today’s challenges and taking definitive steps toward implementation across the financial sector.”
Highlights from SFF 2022
Coinbase’s former CTO Balaji Srinivasan, discussed the concept of new digital states emerging from collectives of digital economy users. He highlighted decentralised financial products and their potential impact on the market.
Nikhil Rathi, chief executive of the UK Financial Conduct Authority took to the stage with Injeti Srinivas, chair of the International Financial Services Centres Authority to debate ESG governance for the financial industry.
Ravi Menon, MD at MAS, delivered a keynote speech that outlined the five key targets for Singapore, including instant remittance, sustainability data, programmable money, atomic settlement and tokenised assets.
Standard Chartered announced at the Singapore Fintech Festival its investment in Partior, the global network for value exchange. As an active participant in the Singapore fintech ecosystem, this investment will make Standard Chartered a founding shareholder of Partior.
The MAS and the Singapore FinTech Association (SFA) announced the award winners of the Global FinTech Hackcelerator and the SFF Global FinTech Awards, at the Singapore FinTech Festival (SFF). The winners, comprising financial institutions, fintechs and solution providers, were recognised for their innovative solutions that can help to accelerate the pace of digitalisation, innovation and sustainability.
More SFF 2022 announcements
Google Cloud announced three key updates under the Point Carbon Zero Program, which was jointly launched with the MAS in July, to catalyse the incubation and adoption of climate fintech solutions in Asia over the next three years.
These updates included the appointment of an advisory board to guide the Point Carbon Zero Program’s ecosystem engagement strategy and initiatives as well as the launch of the inaugural Climate Finance Accelerator to provide climate fintech firms and startups with mentorship and funding opportunities. It also included the onboarding of several high-growth technology firms to the Program.
Angel Zhao, president of international business at Ant Group, shared the vision of Alipay+ and its latest developments at the Singapore Fintech Festival. The global merchant coverage of Alipay+ by sector includes over 1,000 online platforms, more than 10 major airports, over 90,000 convenience stores, over 360,000 restaurants, nearly 200,000 taxis and major hotel brands, department stores, duty-free shops and tourist facilities in Asia and Europe.
Over the past six months, Alipay+ has been gaining ground in markets including Southeast Asia, South Korea and Japan, connecting local and regional merchants with various digital payment methods.
