Fintech News Issue #104 February 9th, 2017

“We need to move from ROI to R&D,” says Nektarios Liolios, CEO & Co-Founder, Startupbootcamp FinTech. “R&D implies failure. It implies experimentation, and just keep trying, keep trying until it works, right? Having been in the financial industry for nearly 20 years now, we don’t have that. There is no concept of building product, or doing anything, with an R&D mentality. Whereas any other industry has that.”

The danger of large companies trying to innovate like a startup is how their collaborations represent the worst of both worlds: throwing mud at the wall, slowly and expensively.

Artificial intelligence is here to stay, and 2017 will be about the adoption of ML/AI by the FinTech community and beyond.

When it comes to Fintech, it appears as though the bloom is finally coming off the rose. Once the hottest sector around, fintech has seen its fair share of failures and struggles as of late.

Credit Risk Management is a hot topic wherever we go. After the financial crisis and credit crunch hit the world economies the importance of Credit Risk Management emerged even more. Credit Portfolios, Credit Scoring and Creditworthiness of individuals and companies are common terms in the everyday life of the financial sector.

Consider the following statistics: Women make 89% of the banking decisions for their families. Just 20% of female breadwinners said they were "very well prepared" to make financial decisions, versus 45% of their male peers.

A look back at the fintech investment landscape of 2016 and an overview of the global fintech deals.

The future of fintech is bright, almost blindingly so, but many of the entrepreneurs in the industry fail to grasp what will eventually lead to the downfall of countless fintech firms, particularly those that lend money.

Cyberattacks on banks and others have seemingly disappeared, making them all the more dangerous.

It’s time to put our carefully laid plans for 2017 into action. What will 2017 bring? We asked two CSCU thought leaders to share with us their predictions for the year and implications for the credit union community.

The term “Blockchain startup” for many immediately conjures up images of money transfer, niche markets and complicated tech. In 2017, however, this stereotype is set to change.

No people. No tellers. Nobody greeting you with “How is your day going?” Although, that may come from a machine — and sooner than you think.

Blockchain based technologies have the potential to disrupt the financial services industry, as reported by a host of industry independent players. Incumbent financial institutions have been exploring the potential of the technology as a means of reducing complexity, cost and improving efficiency.

With all the opposition, uncertainty and general tumult that plague financial institutions' transformation efforts, it's a recipe for disaster that can discourage even the best-intentioned and most committed change agents in the industry.