Mastercard and the Land Transport Authority (LTA) in Singapore have teamed up to launch a pilot programme enabling commuters to pay for transit fares using contactless payment cards through an account-based ticketing (ABT) system.
In the name of innovation Thomson Reuters has officially opened a lab in the Singapore nation. It’s called Thomson Reuters Labs – Singapore, and will do the usual stuff. Namely, collaborate with the government, customers, tech start-ups and universities to “build partnerships and create innovative products and solutions for professional markets” throughout the Asia Pacific […]
Insurance Australia Group (IAG) is looking to build an insurtech hub in Singapore. The new unit, Firemark Labs, will act as an incubator for IAG and help teamwork between start-ups and research and tech partners for new products and services across Australia, New Zealand and Asia. Julie Batch, chief customer officer, IAG, says “customer lifestyles […]
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has set up a new Data Analytics Group (DAG) with effect from 15 March 2017 as it looks to improve the financial sector and digital economy. DAG will use data analytics for insights, “enhance the supervision” of financial institutions, make regulatory compliance better for financial institutions, and improve work […]
Standard Chartered has unveiled its Open Banking Application Programming Interface (API) Developer Portal for transaction banking. The launch is part of its “digitisation agenda” and to increase collaboration with corporates, fintech firms and developer communities. The portal will initially provide a repository of API services focused on cash management and then roll out other API […]
POSB, one of Singapore’s oldest banks and part of the DBS Banking Group, has launched an online virtual assistant. It is powered by the KAI conversational bot/AI platform from a New York-based fintech start-up, Kasisto.
Look back at some of the top-read feature articles on all matters fintech published by Banking Technology in 2016.
Bank of Singapore has completed the acquisition of the wealth and investment management business of Barclays in Hong Kong and Singapore. The combined entity has more than $75 billion of assets under management (AUM) and nearly 400 specialist bankers.
In her new column for Banking Technology, Devie Mohan, a fintech market strategist, looks at how Singapore has created a fintech ecosystem that is a major threat to the ones in London and Berlin.
IBM has unveiled a blockchain-powered Know Your Customer (KYC) project with Singapore start-up KYCK! to help financial services providers onboard customers quicker and cheaper. Using the open source Hyperledger Project Fabric, IBM says immutability, traceability and privacy of the information is provided on a permissioned distributed ledger which is “critical” in a highly regulated environment. […]
OCBC says it is the first bank in Southeast Asia to use blockchain for local and cross-border interbank fund transfers. A successful pilot payment transaction was carried out between the bank and its subsidiaries, OCBC Malaysia and Bank of Singapore, using a payment blockchain solution designed by OCBC and local payments firm BCS Information Systems […]
DBS has launched its Singapore innovation lab – DBS Asia X (or DAX) – as it looks to speed up change in its organisation. Neal Cross, chief innovation officer at DBS Bank, says the bank is “not known for taking huge risks or making massive pivots” but now it wants to “inculcate start-up mindsets”. DAX […]
Australia and New Zealand-based banking group, ANZ, has launched an innovation lab, called ANZ BlueSpace, in Singapore as it looks to work with fintech participants from industry, academia and government. ANZ will tap into Singapore’s “thriving fintech community” and develop capabilities for its institutional customers. David Green, ANZ CEO Singapore and head of South East […]
Byte Academy has unveiled its first international campus with programmes in fintech, data science and Python full-stack development. The new campus is based in Singapore, supported by Standard Chartered Bank, IBM, Thomson Reuters, Microsoft and the Insead business school.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is withdrawing the merchant bank status of Falcon Private Bank’s Singapore branch for “serious failures” in anti-money laundering (AML) controls and “improper conduct” by senior management at the head office in Switzerland as well as the Singapore branch. MAS is also imposing financial penalties on DBS Bank and UBS’s […]
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and five local polytechnics have teamed up to get students up to speed for fintech jobs of the future. They have agreed to work on a framework to review and improve the polytechnics’ curricula in the next three years to prepare and equip their graduates with the skill sets […]
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) have signed an agreement to foster more fintech co-operation. The plan is to share information, support financial innovators, smooth out regulations, and offer more dialogue and secondments. To provide more evidence, FINMA says it is “consistently removing unnecessary regulatory hurdles” – […]
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has released a consultation paper on proposed changes to the payments regulatory framework and establishment of a National Payments Council. Jacqueline Loh, MAS deputy managing director, says this is an “important step for MAS and the payments industry to co-create the future of Singapore’s payments landscape; one where payments […]
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has opened its purpose-built fintech innovation lab – known as Looking Glass @ MAS. MAS says the lab will allow it to experiment with financial institutions, start-ups, and technology vendors. In addition, Looking Glass @ MAS will help consultations between start-ups and industry experts in areas such as legal […]
Hitachi and the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ (BTMU) have started proof of concept (PoC) testing for using blockchain in the digitalisation of cheques in Singapore. In this PoC testing, Hitachi and BTMU developed a system in which a blockchain infrastructure is used for issuing, transferring and collecting electronic cheques. BTMU issues and settles them, while […]
OCBC Bank’s fintech accelerator programme, the Open Vault, will pilot tests with three start-ups – Fincast, BondIT and CogniCor. The tests involve wealth management and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions and will begin in the fourth quarter of this year, and will last for three months. Samuel Tsien, OCBC Bank’s group CEO, says: “Deploying these solutions […]
Singapore-based DBS Bank has signed an agreement with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to use its cloud technology. The bank envisages shifting up to 50% of its computer workload to cloud within a two-year period. With this deal, DBS will create a hybrid cloud environment “optimised” for rapid changes of capacity and functionality, which is “complementary” […]
IBM plans to establish the “first” IBM Center for Blockchain Innovation in Singapore. The firm says this is the first collaboration of its kind with the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) and the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). IBM researchers will work with government, industries and academia to develop applications and solutions which are based […]
DBS Bank says it is the first Singapore bank to adopt cloud-based productivity technology, Office 365, in the workplace. The bank says its “early” adoption of cloud among financial sector players comes amid Singapore’s “smart nation drive as well as a digital revolution that is redefining the banking industry”. DBS says fintech pose an “increasing […]
Banks in Singapore are working together on a new service that will allow users to make payments using Twitter usernames or Facebook IDs. According to the FT, a pilot is due to take place in the first quarter of 2017. Rather than entering an account number and sort code, users will be able to make […]
Android Pay has launched in Singapore, making it the first country in Asia to get the system. Pali Bhat, senior director of product management at Google, says Singapore was chosen as the third market worldwide after the US and UK due to the number of mobile phone users and highly developed infrastructure. Android Pay will […]
Wirecard Singapore, part of Wirecard Group, and NETS (Network for Electronic Transfers {Singapore}) have partnered to provide a single terminal payment solution for Singapore government agencies. The move will enable users to use their CEPAS (Contactless e-Purse Application) cards such as NETS FlashPay, EZ-Link and concession cards on one single device. Wirecard says CEPAS cards […]
Apple Pay support is expanding beyond American Express to Visa and MasterCard credit and debit cards from five of Singapore’s major banks. The big banks include POSB, DBS, OCBC, Standard Chartered and UOB. This latest deal is a significant development for Apple as it now has more than 80% of the Visa and MasterCard credit […]
Swiss vendor MIT (Micro-Informatique & Technologies) has signed a contract with OCBC Bank to support its commodity trade finance business with its TRAC (Trade Risk Active Control) system. Maggie Cheong, head of transaction and collateral management, global commodities finance at OCBC, explains the bank’s choice: “We have chosen the TRAC system as it provides the […]
Kyc.com, a joint venture between Markit and Genpact, has announced the expansion of its Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance and diligence service to Hong Kong and Singapore. This roll out is in addition to jurisdictional coverage in the US, UK and Australia which it launched in 2014. A number of banks are already signed up […]
The Singapore Exchange is to launch FX block futures on ICAP’s FX platform EBS Market, in a deal the two companies say will bridge the FX OTC and futures markets. The move comes as regulators around the world seek to move as much trading activity towards cleared platforms as possible, as part of the ongoing G20 reform agenda.
A prosperous, clean and safe place to visit, Singapore also offers a wide variety of culinary delights.
Swift has named the 20 finalists for the 2015 Innotribe Startup Challenge finale, which will take place at Sibos in Singapore this October. The finalists include companies focused on personal finance, foreign exchange, data protection, mobile banking and e-commerce as well as social media, big data, payments and many other areas.
Singapore futures market Cleartrade Exchange has launched a new matching and trading platform, CLTX Trader, which will go live on Deutsche Börse’s global trading architecture. The exchange says the new technology will help support more advanced trading strategies for commodity derivatives.
Singapore’ DBS Bank has begun a major overhaul of its financial crime prevention strategy, as the bank seeks to upgrade its suspicious activity monitoring, due diligence and risk tools.
Deutsche Börse, Eurex and the Bombay Stock Exchange have further extended their strategic cooperation offering connectivity services. Participants of BSE will be able to use Deutsche Börse’s resilient low latency N7 network services to connect to BSE back-ends in India through the Deutsche Börse access points in Hong Kong and Singapore.
The Singapore challenge Singapore is an advanced economy that employs a variety of clearing and settlement systems. It needed to transform its payments infrastructure to offer instant interbank transfers. The core technology VocaLink could deliver a practical solution, Immediate Payments (IPS), and also offer practical support during the implementation and beyond. BCS could embed IPS […]
As the global banks grapple with tides of regulation, fines, and a myriad of other post-crisis issues, local Asian institutions are tooling up and stepping in to fill the gaps.
Sourcing the right collateral to cover global exposures has risen up the list of priorities for financial institutions in Asia in the past 12 months as concerns mount over a possible collateral shortfall, according to a poll conducted by the Singapore Exchange and Clearstream at the Global Securities Financing Conference Asia 2014 in Singapore.
IntercontinentalExchange is to acquire Singapore Mercantile Exchange, including the venue’s clearing house, in a deal that will give it a foothold in Asia for the first time. SMX offers futures for metals, currencies, energy and agricultural commodities.
