
Do you remember when you first saw a newspaper app on an iPad? It was as though a physical newspaper had been trapped under the black glass. There was even a page turning animation that you probably showed your friends. It was magical. It was digitised news. Ditto for buying albums on iTunes and ordering a traditional taxi; amazing experiences, but we just took what had come before and translated it directly to the new medium.

Africa is the most worthy market for mainstream adoption of decentralised finance. Why? I could go on and on about the underbanked, underserved populations and fragmented remittance ecosystem - while that’s all valid, the biggest pain point in my mind is currency devaluation. Volatile currencies make it difficult for Africans’ savings to hold their value. Solving for currency devaluation will provide the beachhead for the adoption of Decentralised Finance (DeFi) across Africa.

The last episode of Under The Hood, the podcast series with 11:FS that took a deep dive into the banking infrastructure that is disrupting traditional banking models and shaking up the system, has been released. And looking back, I realise how many great conversations we’ve had.

There’s a lot going on right now on personal, business and industry levels. But as I sit here in my home office over the last month talking to senior people in financial services, fintech founders and project teams all over the world, one thing keeps returning to me: “See, we didn’t need more strategy”.

In today's globalized business environment, the discussion around offering alternative payment methods (APMs) to end users continues to grow. APMs can provide businesses with improved cost efficiency, better user experience, broader access to various user segments, and thus increased conversion rates. However, it is essential to carefully consider the challenges and potential drawbacks that come with adopting APMs before fully embracing them.

Dutch directness, failing fast and innovating endlessly are the three common themes in the interview Simon did with Benoit Legrand, CIO of ING. And they’re what drives his approach to delivering success at ING.

With remote working now the norm for most of us, the need to prioritise is more important than ever.

Good content is so important now more than ever, especially for B2B content creators. In a saturated market only good content stands out - or bad but usually for the wrong reasons, and mediocre content just doesn’t get traction at all.

In a recent episode of our Insurtech Insider podcast, Nigel Walsh and John Bean sat down with some fantastic guests to chat about the good, the bad and the ugly. No, not the seminal spaghetti Western with the Ennio Morricone score.

With consumers becoming increasingly conscious of the impact of their lives, and financial services providers, on the environment, how can retail banks look to react to this trend?

Nearly a year ago now (how time flies during a global pandemic) we wrote that there’s never been a more important time to be truly digital. Little did we know that this would ring truer today than it did then!

As 2019 winds down, we’re doing something a little different for this year and reviewing our best and most popular podcast episodes.

Like everyone else locked down here in the UK, I’ve been working my way through Netflix at an unrelenting pace... This is taken from our Unfiltered newsletter. Subscribe now for a no BS, uncensored analysis of fintech news and hot topics delivered to your inbox each fortnight.

It’s not often that we see regulation pre-empting innovation – rarer still to see it drive innovation forward.

Gwera Kiwana is joined by some great guests, from NovoPayment, Treasury Prime and Anthemis, to find out who are the winners and losers of the embedded finance revolution.

Benjamin Ensor and Sim Rai are joined by some great guests, from Tranch and Anthemis, to talk about the most interesting stories in financial services over the last 7 days, including: Klarna lays off 10% of its workforce via video message, Chase marks 500,000 UK customers, and our panel answers your questions!

Gwera Kiwana and Benjamin Ensor are joined by some great guests, from Griffin, Indebted and Redpoint Ventures, to talk about the most interesting stories in financial services over the last 7 days, including: Griffin applies for UK banking licence, Digital debt collection agency InDebted looks to shake up the UK market, and Goldman Sachs offers senior staff unlimited holiday!

Kate Moody is joined by some great guests, from Lucky and Global Ventures, to talk about the rise of fintech in Egypt!

Sarah Kocianski and Kate Moody joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Santander buys Wirecard’s core European business for €100m, PNC buys BBVA USA and the FCA says no, as Lanister launches its new polymorphic payment card.

David Brear is joined by some great guests to discuss the fintech path to profitability.

Sarah Kocianski and Nigel Walsh are joined by a panel of guests to talk about travel insurance, and how Covid-19 has changed the face of the industry. All this and much much more on today's Insurtech Insider!

Ross Gallagher and Simon Taylor are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Ant Group and the biggest IPO of all time, cryptocurrency initiatives amongst industry giants PayPal and JP Morgan, and raccoons break into California bank.

Simon Taylor and Mel Stringer are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Stripe acquires Nigeria’s Paystack, Marqeta’s research discovers Covid-19 has forced three-quarters of banks to change their future strategy, and ESG funds forecast to outnumber conventional funds by 2025.

Sarah Kocianski and Nigel Walsh are joined by a panel of guests to talk through the most interesting news from the insurance and insurtech sphere!

Ross Gallagher is joined by some great guests to discuss how fintech and digital transformation is shaking up the financial landscape of the Middle East.

For World Mental Health Day, David Brear is joined by some great guests to discuss money and mental health during the coronavirus pandemic.

Sarah Kocianski and Nigel Walsh are joined by a panel of guests to talk about health insurance post COVID-19!

Sarah Kocianski and Ross Gallagher are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Open Banking doubles its user base in 2020, Amazon's new payment method in the palm of your hand, and can Ping An rescue HSBC?

Simon Taylor is joined by some great guests to talk about the growth of ESG and sustainable finance
Regulation is essential. It stops banks from going bust or behaving badly.
Lending has been around for thousands of years and is one of the cornerstones of banking.
Mastercard and Visa are the two biggest credit card networks in the world.
We kick off our Decoding: Banks series with a look at the banking landscape today and how we got here.

David M. Brear, our 11:FS CEO, takes us through legacy technology within banks - but of course, with a really cool Lightboard.

There are one billion people globally who can't prove their identity. That's a big problem for accessing financial services.
Inclusive design is a mindset and a process that suggests that you should bring as many people as possible - and the most diverse of voices that you can - into your product design product process, so that you're being truly inclusive. It's designing with people rather that just at them. Charlotte Fereday, Product Director, Ventures, explains what inclusive design is, why it's important, how you can design more inclusively, and answers - how possible is truly inclusive design?
On this episode of Spotlight, 11:FS Crypto Global Strategy Director, Mauricio Magaldi is joined by Ramp Network Co-Founder and CEO, Szymon Sypniewicz. In today's chat, the pair discuss Szymon's career, the current regulatory landscape in crypto, and what the future might hold when it comes to widespread crypto adoption.

The UK banking battlefield has never been more competitive. Customers expectfinancial apps that are personalised, seamless, and that genuinely make a differenc...


The UK banking battlefield has never been more competitive. Customers expectfinancial apps that are personalised, seamless, and that genuinely make a differenc...

