Financial Services/Finserv


PSD2: regulation as a catalyst for innovation

PSD2 comes into force on 13 January 2018. It aims to open up the European payments market to greater competition and transparency, but its effect will be more far-reaching, acting as a catalyst for innovation not just in payments, but in the wider financial services market.

Infographic: GDPR & B2B marketers – less aware but more prepared

According to the latest research by DMA, a UK trade association for the one-to-one marketing industry, those in the B2B space are trailing slightly when it comes to having a detailed awareness of what the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) laws entail.

What is the future of digital cash?

The recent World Economic Forum (WED) report “Sweden could stop using cash by 2023”, says that the country is moving towards favouring cards and mobile payment apps. Yet retailers are expected to accept cash for at least a couple of years afterwards.

The missing link: the supply side of cryptocurrency

Supply and demand are the bedrock of market-based economics. To achieve economic equilibrium, supply and demand must be in balance. If one is too high or too low, the system is in a state of disequilibrium, associated with inefficient allocation of goods – not a healthy state.

AWS goes on GuardDuty for cloud security

While Amazon Web Services (AWS) is considered the undisputed leader in public cloud services, the company continues to make improvements to its platform. Security is now the next step, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister publication). At its re:Invent 2017 customer showcase in Las Vegas this week, AWS unveiled its new security service called […]

Fintech funding round-up: 1 December 2017

Who doesn’t love a trilogy? Following on from the round-ups on Thursday (30 November) and Tuesday (28 November) here’s another slice of fintech funding action. Features Deposit Solutions, Hanson Robotics’ Sophia, and BNP Paribas Asset Management. Germany’s Deposit Solutions, an open banking platform for deposits, has closed an investment round of $20 million led by […]

Blockchain and Bitcoin round-up: 1 December 2017

Quickly following on from yesterday’s (30 November) blockchain and Bitcoin round-up, here’s more action. Features money laundering in Japan; Coinsource ATMs in Georgia; Cardano Foundation, IOHK and Emurgo teaming up; and PwC in Hong Kong. Over in Japan, Kyodo and Jiji news sites have reported 170 cases of suspected money laundering linked to cryptocurrencies were […]

RightCapital integrates with Envestnet | Tamarac API

Thanks to a new partnership between RightCapital and Envestnet | Tamarac, financial advisors on RightCapital’s platform will be able to use Tamarac’s API to directly access account and holdings information from their clients, enabling real-time financial and tax planning advisory, reports David Penn at Finovate (Banking Technology’s sister company). RightCapital’s technology used Monte Carlo simulations to enable […]

Amazon launches private cloud connection service

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is launching the PrivateLink private network service to allow Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) developers to provide private endpoints to users, increasing security for enterprises by eliminating the need to expose data to the public internet, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister publication). AWS PrivateLink also connects services across multiple accounts and virtual […]

VMware’s cloud fortunes continue in Q3

VMware continues to expand beyond its traditional role in the virtualisation market into areas such as cloud computing and software-defined data centre offerings, and the company’s bets on these areas are paying off, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister publication). The firm released its third-quarter financial results, beating Wall Street expectations by $0.07 per […]

RBS closes 259 more branches and axes 680 jobs

There is another wave of cuts as the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is closing 259 more branches and axing 680 jobs. This development follows the previous branch closure announcements which resulted in over 500 branches being lost. In June, RBS said 443 jobs are to go from its business loans department. Many of these […]

Case study: Triodos Bank – banking on ethical values

Triodos Bank in the UK stands out from the crowd for its ethical values but can it now kick on with a leap into the current account market? Banking Technology talks to UK MD, Bevis Watts, about this major development and the technology that underpins it.

Lloyds and Bank of Scotland hit by payment processing problems

Customers of Lloyds and Bank of Scotland have reported a host of payment processing problems as UK banks yet again fail to deliver banking services. In the repellent realm of Twitter, some users reported that wages weren’t paid at the end of the month. With the processing system down, bosses couldn’t pay their staff and […]

Amazon brings machine learning to “everyday developers”

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is looking to bring machine learning (ML) to ordinary developers, launching the SageMaker service to simplify building applications, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister publication). ML is too complicated for ordinary developers, AWS CEO Andy Jassy said at a keynote during the AWS re:Invent event. “If you want to enable most […]

Payments round-up: 30 November 2017

We did say there will be no quiet days. Coming straight after yesterday’s (29 November) action, we bring another payments round-up. Features Interac, nanopay, Remitr, ADGM, Nordea, Nets, Facebook and Amazon.

Fintech funding round-up: 30 November 2017

Quickly following on from Tuesday’s (28 November) funding round-up, here are more stories from a cash-drenched world. Features 1QB Information Technologies, FinTecSystems, Betalo, Nordea and Constellation Digital Partners. 1QB Information Technologies (1QBit), a quantum computing firm based in Vancouver, has closed a CA$45 million ($34.9 million) Series B round comprising equity and revenue contracts. This […]

Ephesoft clearly unveils mobile document capture solution

Document capture and analytics solution developer Ephesoft has released version 4.0 of its Transact Mobile SDK, reports David Penn at Finovate (Banking Technology’s sister company). The latest version of the technology takes advantage of innovations in everything from deep learning to mobile architecture to give consumers more accuracy and flexibility when it comes to document capture with […]

Concur launches e-receipt solution for WeChat

Business expense management firm Concur has introduced a new receipt solution, integrated with China’s WeChat platform, that makes it easier for businesses and their employees working in China to track expenses and remain compliant, reports David Penn at Finovate (Banking Technology’s sister company). The technology, Concur e-Fapiao (it means “e-receipt”), gives employers real-time access to an employee’s […]

Lloyds to cut 49 more branches

The UK trade union Unite has revealed that Lloyds has informed staff it will be closing another 49 branches of the Halifax, Bank of Scotland and Lloyds, resulting in 99 job losses. Rob MacGregor, Unite national officer, says: “Having returned to profitability Lloyds needs to stop ignoring its corporate social responsibilities. Just over six months […]

FinReach extends digital reach to Austria and Spain

German digital account exchange provider FinReach has expanded into Austria and Spain – meaning its service is now used by over 500 banks in three countries. In Austria, FinReach has partnered with, amongst others, banking group Raiffeisen Austria, which includes 434 banks and has 1.7 million customers. In terms of the Spanish market, Self Bank, […]

The AI arms race might be a bit more dangerous than you think

In the tech world, an arms race usually a metaphor for two companies battling for supremacy, but McAfee thinks it might be a bit more literal for artificial intelligence (AI) as hackers upskill to make use of the breakthrough, reports Telecoms.com (Banking Technology‘s sister publication). As one of its predictions for 2018, security software vendor […]

Amazon closes cloud performance gap with “bare metal instances”

Amazon Web Services (AWS) kicked off its annual re:Invent conference with a new service designed to make its cloud more competitive to enterprise IT in performance and security, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister publication). EC2 Bare Metal Instances gives enterprises the “best of both worlds,” Peter DeSantis, AWS VP of global infrastructure, said, […]

Microsoft and SAP expand HANA and Azure partnership

Microsoft and SAP are expanding their current cloud partnership to include additional support for SAP software running on the Azure public cloud. The two companies also plan to use each other’s applications internally, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister publication). The expanded partnership coincides with Microsoft’s biggest rival for public cloud – Amazon Web […]

Bankers and retailers – will we see roles switch? Or simply morph into a single discipline?

Technology is having a tremendous impact on the way communities shop so changes are more or less expected as we see these shopping mall operators push back on so many dire predictions being made about them. But can they change and yes, could these changes lead to a greater overlap with banking as it exists today? Do we even need differentiation between the two and yes, will they both be able to keep us satisfied when it comes to access to our cash?

VMware and Amazon grow hybrid cloud tie-up

VMware and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are expanding their hybrid cloud partnership to run VMware workloads at “very large scale” on AWS, a VMware executive says. VMware is launching new tools for migrating and scaling production applications to AWS, as well as business continuity and disaster recovery services, reports Enterprise Cloud News (Banking Technology’s sister […]