Fintech News Issue #119 May 25th, 2017

We discuss what a challenger bank really is – drawing a line in the sand for who is and who isn’t in the cool kids club. Alipay seems to be taking over the world through tourism, we discuss how that strategy might be the best route into the west.

No one's talking about the real motivations behind demonetization.

ANY technological revolution or industrial change brings with it an element of fear for workers. When the Luddites smashed up weaving machines in the 19th century, they did it out of fear for their livelihoods.

Grab one of the last seats and learn more about the future payments technologies, get an insight into the main trends in digitization, potential of Artificial Intelligence. Meet top-level decision makers from Raiffeisen Bank, UniCredit, Bank of England and other prestigious institutions. SPECIAL DISCOUNT CODE: fintechweekly2017.

Bitcoin might finally be overlapping the broader fintech industry's popularity. Norway's largest online-only bank, Skandiabanken recently announced it plans to offer clients the ability to link bank accounts to cryptocurrency holdings.

A lack of understanding and of the will to change is often described through the story of the boiling frog. The frog is said to be unable to sense the increasing water temperature and will not search for a way out of his misery – leading to his inevitable death.

The evolution of the customer service in traditional banking was very slow during the past few decades. One of the milestones in that matter was probably the invention of the ATM in 1967 for the automation of bank-teller operations. Then the customer support in branches started to migrate to telephone banking, followed by the smartphone era that changed the approach of banks in dealing with customers.

Despite all the shiny fintechs out there, consumers still expect innovation in financial services to come directly from banks.

Traditionally, at the end of the first quarter of the year analytical agencies present their reports and forecasts for the years to come. We have collected some important reviews to see the predictions about the development of the IoT sector and telematics segment.

The idea of banks using a platform like the Apple App Store to plug in different fintech services as part of their own product suite to customers is where some believe the banking industry is headed.

Brett King coined an idea that banking is no longer somewhere you go but something you do. Indeed, over the past decade or so, the banking industry made a tremendous shift from financial services as services to financial services as experiences. In banking, as probably in everything else, the modern customer constantly seeks for a better experience.

Never before has the battle to hold on to consumer banking relationships been as heated. McKinsey estimates that in five primary retail banking businesses, from 20 to 60% of profits could be at risk as business shifts and margin compression occurs.

When I talk to most bank CEOs in the U.S. about the European Union regulation that requires financial institutions to make consumer data available via application programming interfaces, I hear fear.

While businesses are catching up with the rise of e-commerce and the mobile-first world, physical interfaces altogether are gradually falling into obsolescence.

Business analytics (BA) and business intelligence (BI) are critical for marketing success where personalization and contextuality are more important than ever.

A meeting of bitcoin startup executives and miners held this weekend has resulted in the publication of a new proposal for how the open-source project should be upgraded to support additional transaction capacity.

While there are many important technological trends impacting the banking industry, none may be more important that artificial intelligence (AI) and the ability to use data, advanced analytics and digital technology to deliver a better customer experience.