Fintech News Issue #218 May 23rd, 2019

Hosts Jason Henrichs and Brett King talk with a number of guests about the wealth gap, the education gap and the technology gap are driving disruption in traditional financial services. Guests include: Ryan Falvey, managing director of Financial Venture Studio, Mark Dowds, founder and chief strategy officer of Trov, Ramona Ortega, founder of My Money My Future and Eric Lugo, vice chancellor, City Colleges of Chicago. Plus, the Financial Studio’s newly released study on the tech driving fintech.

ZURICH (Reuters) - Facebook has set up a new financial technology company in Switzerland focusing on blockchain and payments as well as data analytics and investing, Geneva’s commercial register shows.

Three years ago, I blogged about three phases of FinTech. Three years later, I can expand on that theme and talk about five phases of FinTech. The five phases of FinTech are (dates are rough guide):

Fintech, short for financial technology, describes how the financial industry has leveraged technology to make financial services cheaper, faster, more efficient, and more accessible.

FinTech platform revenues will reach $638 billion by 2024, up from an estimated $263 billion in 2019. And blockchain technology will have a key role to play, according to Juniper Research.

LatAm is not traditionally considered a popular region for FinTech developments. With major headlines being hogged by China’s FinTech giants, America’s booming VC investment and the growth of open banking in Europe, it’s not hard to see why LatAm struggles to get a look in. But is the lack of attention justified, or is this region flying under the radar?

In Egypt, cash is king, even when it comes to salaries. Of the 100 million-strong population, the World Bank estimates that just 10-15 per cent have a bank account, one of the lowest penetration rates in the world.

Europe has a new fintech leader as of today with TransferWise assuming this mantle and boasting a valuation of $3.5 billion. The rise in fortunes for the money transfer company caps off a string of investments and deals that have placed it amongst leading venues on the continent, per a CNBC report.

The financial industry was one of the first to adopt and enjoy the benefits of artificial intelligence (AI). The annual budgets of large banks amount to billions of dollars, which is comparable to the state budgets of some developing countries. No surprise that banks and financial organizations will be the key drivers of AI R&D in FinTech.

It just got easier for popular finance apps to link to digital banks, instead of traditional ones.

Acquiring Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based InstaMed helps to expand JPMorgan's corporate payments business into the lucrative healthcare space. U.S. healthcare spending clocks in at more than $3 trillion annually and is expected to grow to $6 trillion by 2027.

The US-based comparison website surveyed 10 fintech leaders on their thoughts and projections on 13 cryptocurrencies (including the top-10 by market capitalization) and the participants included executives from BitBull Capital, Arca, and Blocktoken.