FinTech Futures: Top five stories of the week – 26 May 2023
Here’s our pick of five of the top news stories from the world of finance and tech this week.
Anne Boden to step down as CEO of Starling Bank
Anne Boden to step down as Starling CEO
UK challenger Starling Bank’s founder Anne Boden is to step down from the role of CEO on 30 June.
Boden will remain on the board as a non-executive director. Starling’s COO, John Mountain, will take over as interim CEO, while the challenger bank commences its global search for a permanent CEO.
The news follows Starling recording pre-tax profits of £195 million for the year to 31 March 2023, a six-fold increase on the previous year’s figure of £32 million – its second year of profitability. Additionally, Starling more than doubled its revenue to £453 million, from last year’s £216 million.
“When I started Starling in 2014, I was told no one ever starts a bank, nobody wins market share and you’ll never make a profit. Today’s results prove them wrong,” Boden says.
New CEO of Pipe builds “fintech dream team”
Pipe, a US-based capital platform, has bolstered its senior management team following the arrival of a new CEO, Luke Voiles, earlier this year.
Namrata Ganatra has been appointed as chief product and technology officer; Scott Polchleb as chief innovation officer; Manpreet Dhot as chief risk officer; and Yasmin Moaven as chief operations and marketing officer.
Ganatra brings a decade of experience in fintech, payments, and crypto markets. Prior to joining Pipe, she led engineering and product at NFT platform Autograph.
Polchleb was previously global head of design and creative at Square Banking (Voiles also moved from Square, where he was general manager of Square Banking).
Dhot, who has over 20 years of experience in commercial and consumer risk management, moves from credit card issuer Imprint, where he was CRO.
Moaven, who’s been with Pipe for three years as chief marketing officer, will expand her role to include chief operations officer.
“In just three years, Pipe has defined a new approach to funding the rapid growth of companies in a wide range of markets,” comments Voiles. The company needs “proven industry leaders” to seize “the enormous opportunity”, he adds.
“This is our fintech dream team.”
Australian government set to regulate BNPL industry
Australia set to regulate the BNPL industry
The Australian government has announced that it will be regulating the buy now, pay later (BNPL) industry, treating BNPL as credit products.
The decision was announced by Australian financial services minister Stephen Jones in a speech at the Responsible Borrowing and Lending Summit held this week in Sydney, Australia.
Jones says the government arrived at the conclusion following an extensive consultation on options to regulate BNPL, which kicked off late last year.
The review raised “significant” concerns in the BNPL industry, including “unacceptable levels” of unaffordable lending, largely concentrated among low‑income borrowers, including those on social security. Additionally, it highlighted concerns about the quality of dispute resolution and hardship processes, excessive fees, poor disclosure practices, problematic marketing practices, and unsolicited credit increases.
As per the government’s plan, BNPL providers will now be regulated under the Credit Act, and will be required to hold Australian credit licences, meet statutory hardship and resolution requirements, and comply with minimum standards of conduct.
India’s PhonePe secures another $100m from General Atlantic
Indian payments giant PhonePe has secured an additional $100 million from existing backer General Atlantic, as part of its efforts to raise $1 billion in funding.
The latest investment brings PhonePe closer to its target amount, having raised a total of $850 million of primary capital in the current round. Of that, General Atlantic has contributed a total of $550 million.
PhonePe kicked off its latest funding round in January, with General Atlantic investing $350 million in the paytech firm at a pre-money valuation of $12 billion. In the second round held in February, PhonePe bagged an additional $100 million from Ribbit Capital, Tiger Global and TVS Capital Funds.
The payments giant capped off March with a $200 million investment from majority investor Walmart, and April saw another $100 million coming in from General Atlantic.
Hong Kong Monetary Authority kickstarts e-HKD retail CBDC pilot
HKMA kicks off e-HKD pilot programme
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has kickstarted its e-HKD pilot programme, a “key component” of its approach to the potential rollout of a retail central bank digital currency (CBDC).
A total of 16 firms have been chosen from across the financial, payments and technology sectors to take part in the first round of pilots this year.
The pilots will take “deep dives”, HKMA says, into potential use cases in six categories: full-fledged payments; programmable payments; offline payments; tokenised deposits; settlement of Web3 transactions; and settlement of tokenised assets.
HKMA chief executive Eddie Yue says that while no decision on a retail CBDC has yet been made, the e-HKD pilot “serves as a tremendous opportunity for the HKMA to collaborate with the industry in exploring innovative use cases and maximising our readiness for a potential e-HKD”.
