FinTech


Barclays backs British fraud fightback

Barclays has unveiled its new £10 million digital safety drive in the UK as it wants to increase the public’s awareness of financial fraud risks. As part of its plan, it will offer new debit card choices to let customers turn on and off remote spending and change ATM limits. It has revealed a new […]

Starling Bank unveils real-time mobile payments

UK challenger bank Starling is staying busy with the launch of its real-time mobile offering, Starling Payment Services. The service, which it calls a new division of the bank, will offer sponsorship access to the UK’s major payment schemes, allowing other banks, payment service providers, and fintech companies to use real-time payments from the summer. […]

The Monday mindset: 8 May 2017

Fintech zeitgeist! Every Monday, we might look back at last week; look ahead to this week; share a few thoughts (our own or others); or discuss anything that catches our eye. This week, Soumik Roy asks – will Paytm become India’s WeChat? Ever since demonetisation, electronic payments in India have been all the rage. In […]

Acorns Australia goes live with Moneythor for personal finance

Micro-investing service Acorns Australia has chosen Moneythor’s machine-learning solution to help it analyse customers’ spending patterns and offer insights into savings. The new “My Finances” features of the Acorns app were developed with Moneythor’s engine. The solution’s predictive analytics and data classification techniques are also used to provide customers with an estimate of their future […]

Research: Decline and fall in correspondent banking relationships

Correspondent banking relationships have reduced globally by 25%, despite the fact that global GDP per capita grew during the same period, following the 2008 financial crisis, according to research by Accuity. Henry Balani, global head of strategic affairs at Accuity, says: “The irony is that regulation designed to protect the global financial system is, in […]

Time running out for CRA rollback of US final prepaid rule

The clock is winding down for US Congressional lawmakers to repeal the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) final prepaid accounts rule under the Congressional Review Act (CRA), reports Paybefore (Banking Technology‘s sister publication). Under that law, Congress has until 9 May – 60 legislative days after the law was published in the Federal Register – to repeal […]

Nordea innovation homes in on Stockholm

Nordea Bank has teamed up with the Stockholm Fintech Hub (SFH) for innovation ambitions and to connect with start-ups, financial institutions and regulators. The bank says a number of people from Nordea will move into the space, so it can talk and work with start-ups, bigger companies, other banks and “new players” like IBM and […]

Fintechs blast banks over PSD2 direct access angst

A group of fintech companies and associations are asking for changes to the second Payment Services Directive (PSD2) due to fears it will force them to become technologically dependent on banks. The coalition of 60 European Union (EU) based entities have signed a seven-page manifesto seeking the European Commission (EC) to make changes to the […]

Middle East and Africa the world’s fastest growing payment cards region

The Middle East and Africa (MEA) is the payment cards region increasing the quickest across the globe, according to research by Retail Banking Research (RBR). According to RBR’s Global Payment Cards Data and Forecasts to 2021, the number of cards in issue in MEA increased by 13% to 611 million in 2015, making it the […]

Travelex preps new challenger bank Ditto for launch

New banks are appearing at the double – and Ditto, a France-based mobile-driven multi-currency bank, is the latest one getting ready to launch. Ditto, which is backed by foreign exchange company Travelex, has been built from scratch over the last two years and is “managed as a separate entity” from Travelex. Ditto is based on […]

The Bancorp Sells European Prepaid Operations

The Bancorp Inc. has closed the sale of its European prepaid properties to Neptune International Ltd. The news comes amid a strong quarter for the financial holding company, which reported a net income of $8 million for the first quarter of 2017, compared with a $10.9 million net loss for the same period last year.

Banks banking on APIs for payments and beyond

Facing increased competition from financial services upstarts and tech firms, banks are doubling down on application programming interfaces (APIs) as a competitive tool, a new report shows. Paybefore (Banking Technology‘s sister publication) reports that an Aite Group study canvassed product and digital channel managers at Asia-Pacific, European and North American banks, and found that those […]

OpenFin tech for capital markets goes open source

New York-based OpenFin has open sourced its core technology and is giving application developers free access to its operating layer for financial desktop web applications via its OpenFin Community Edition. The firm, which is a provider of HTML5 runtime technology, says the open source project, called Hadouken, will run under an Apache 2.0 licence. It […]

Infographics: UK’s fintech job market

Time for some simpler infographics. According to meta search engine Joblift, there has been an average monthly growth of 5% in the number of fintech jobs posted in the UK in the past year, this is in comparison with a growth of 1% in the UK job market as a whole. Joblift found that London […]

Idea’s express bank branch hits the tracks

Poland’s Idea Bank has launched the first bank branch on rail tracks and the first co-working space for travellers. Called the Idea Hub Express carriage, the bank selected Poland’s PKP intercity trains, and the hub will be for passengers traveling on the Warsaw-Poznan-Warsaw, Warsaw-Krakow-Warsaw and Warsaw-Wrocław-Warsaw routes. Selected trains linking the cities will have a […]

Fintech funding round-up: 4 May 2017

Money talks, but it doesn’t sing and dance, and it doesn’t walk. And long as I can have you here with me, I’d much rather be, forever in fintech funding. Featuring FriendlyScore, Nav, Stockspot and InDebted. London-based FriendlyScore, a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) B2B credit-scoring platform, will be opening its doors to new investors. The company is […]

UK’s CYBG banking group launches innovation lab

UK-based Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank – which together form CYBG – have launched their banking innovation lab on Kensington High Street in London. Called Studio B – CYBG partnered with design consultancy Market Gravity to design, implement and launch the lab. Nick Sherrard, managing director, Market Gravity Edinburgh, says it will be exploring voice […]

Banking Technology May 2017 issue out now

The latest edition of our flagship magazine – Banking Technology – is out now, packed with news, analysis and insights, case studies, research and expert commentary.

Philippines’ UnionBank picks IBM Cloud for app overhaul

UnionBank of the Philippines (UnionBank) has selected IBM Cloud to build, deploy, run and manage new apps for its digital customer base. Through the IBM Bluemix cloud platform and IBM API Connect, UnionBank says it can create, manage, secure and run APIs that the bank has made available internally and run them externally for consumption. […]

Humans hanging on in RBS hybrid bot plan

New York-based LivePerson has rolled out the “first financial industry hybrid bots in the world” at the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), offering a service where humans and bots can team up in one conversation. With RBS continuing with branch closures and job cuts, and seeking a digital redress to a financial mess; the idea […]

Gently does it for FIS revenue rise

It’s a tale of small numbers with FIS’s latest financial results revealing a moderate rise for earnings and revenue. In its first quarter, FIS’s GAAP revenue increased 3.4% to $2.2 billion from $2.1 billion in the prior year quarter. Operating income increased to $260 million for the quarter, from $184 million in the prior year […]

Banks Banking on APIs for Payments and Beyond

Facing increased competition from financial services upstarts and tech firms, banks are doubling down on application programming interfaces (APIs) as a competitive tool, a new report shows.

Apple Pay ready to go for HSBC Australia

With the battle of the four banks won, Apple Pay’s fight to retain its Australian smartphone market continues as HSBC Australia is now offering support for its customers for the first time. Back in March, Apple Pay emerged victorious in its long-running feud with four domestic banks over their permission to collectively bargain with Apple […]

Blockchain and Bitcoin round-up: 3 May 2017

No need to pace yourself. Here’s a quick blockchain and Bitcoin round-up. Featuring Infosys Finacle, Commercial Bank of Qatar, Adel and Blockpool. Infosys Finacle and the Commercial Bank of Qatar have completed a pilot on the “first ever” cloud-based blockchain network to process international remittances. The bank, along with its subsidiary Alternatifbank (ABank) in Turkey, […]

Hackers cybersquatting on hundreds of UK bank domains

Cybersquatters have wormed their way onto hundreds of websites and are tricking web users into thinking they’re clicking on to UK high street bank websites. According to research by DomainTools, a DNS-based cyber threat intelligence firm, it found 324 registered domains using the trademarked names of five of the UK’s top high street banks – […]

Paper put in place by Singapore’s simpler banking plan

Singapore is piloting a new initiative to let people apply for a bank account without needing to submit supporting documentation. The Smart Nation and Digital Government Office, Government Technology Agency and Monetary Authority of Singapore, have begun a pilot with four banks to explore simplifying online banking transactions with the use of the government’s MyInfo […]

US payroll cards not lively enough for customers’ lives

The US payroll card industry received high marks for its standards and its ability to “stretch beyond the basics” but got an average mark for its ability to provide additional services that “improve customers’ lives,” reports Paybefore (Banking Technology‘s sister publication). According to the first-ever “Payroll Industry Scorecard” from the Center for Financial Services Innovation […]

Lessons learnt on a start-up journey

I grew up in Darwin, northern Australia and dreamt of playing hockey for my country. Today I live in Glasgow, thousands of miles away from the sunny climes of home and head up the UK operations and marketing for regtech firm Encompass.

Old Mutual Wealth drops IFDS from £450m tech revamp contract

UK investment service Old Mutual Wealth (OMW) has terminated its £450 million tech revamp contract with International Financial Data Services (IFDS) due to rising costs. OMW says the costs of implementation – which entails platform delivery and outsourcing services – would have been “materially greater than those advised to the market” in October 2016 (see […]

Barclays opens Europe’s largest fintech site in London

Barclays has opened its new open innovation site, Rise London, in Shoreditch – hailed as Europe’s “largest co-working space dedicated to fintech”. Rise will be a place for start-ups, corporate clients and others to co-create new products, services and platforms. The bank also has six other innovation sites in New York, Manchester (UK), Mumbai, Cape […]

Innotribe unveils ten start-ups for Africa challenge

Innotribe, Swift’s innovation arm, has named the ten firms who will compete in its Start-up Challenge Africa. The start-ups will pitch their products in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, on 17 May 2017 during Swift’s African Regional Conference. Innotribe evaluated close to 100 applications received for the third edition of the Startup Challenge in Africa. The applications […]

Mastercard’s $920m acquisition of VocaLink officially closes

Mastercard has officially completed the acquisition of VocaLink with the all clear from the UK’s Competition & Markets Authority (CMA) to buy 92.4% for $920 million. The CMA gave final approval for the proposed set of remedies that address the competition concerns it identified earlier this year. As Banking Technology reported at that time, CMA […]

Lehigh Valley Educators CU live with new core tech

Lehigh Valley Educators Credit Union has gone live with a new core processing platform, Keystone, supplied by Corelation. The Pennsylvania-based credit union stated its tech renovation project last year.

US bill targets Consumer Financial Protection Bureau revamp

The US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is the target of a bill that includes myriad changes to its responsibilities and structure, reports Paybefore (Banking Technology‘s sister publication). US representative Jeb Hensarling (Republican, Texas) has pulled the trigger, reintroducing legislation that has the Dodd-Frank Act squarely in its crosshairs. The act comprises major changes to […]

Australia’s Mosaic to unveil “bank account on steroids”

An Australian start-up is set to launch a “bank account on steroids” by offering investment, transaction and savings accounts in one product. Called Mosaic, the bank will allow a user to invest in any asset class if they’re an active investor or be risk profiled to determine a passive fund “best suited to their situation”. […]