Global

Incumbent banks are losing. It’s no secret that challenger banks are taking advantage of the opportunities that incumbents have left on the table. But what if that could change?

Four years ago, policymakers in the UK and EU took the first steps to enshrine open banking into law, but now we’re at a turning point for digital adoption and the old ways of working aren’t working anymore.

Each week, Leda Glyptis, CEO of 11:FS Foundry, creates #LedaWrites. This week it's all about a word we've heard and spoken more than any other over the last few months - 'normal'

Awards?! ‘Yay’, I hear you say. But it’s not like this wasn’t a crowded market already, so surely this is nothing new, right? Check out more details on our awards show here.

Every Thursday, Leda Glyptis, CEO of 11:FS Foundry creates #LedaWrites. This week she returns to the topic of gender.

At some point for every product, you’ll have gone through an initial period of exciting discovery. 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.

By Michael Douglas, Vice President, Strategy, Galileo

TL;DR None of the challenger banks use blockchain, the guy who’s leading the most popular smart contract platform (Ethereum) say’s it’s a bad idea. So, I mean read on…but. No, don’t use a blockchain or smart contracts for the love of god.

I’d like to start this by stating that Africa is not a monolith and for the purpose of this post, I’ll be zeroing in on the East and West African markets. 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 been an incredible year for fintech, but one thing’s for sure. 2019 is going to be an even wilder ride.

So about 350 days ago I made some predictions about how 2019 would shape up. Here I’ll break down how accurate, or not, I was. TL:DR - pretty damn accurate.

Niall Cameron joined David Brear on Fintech Insider to discuss HSBC, innovation and partnering with fintechs. We found out his views of how incumbents can best work alongside and partner with fintechs in the changing digital space:

As a uni student, it drove Ollie Purdue crazy that his bank couldn’t provide him with basic info to help manage his financial life. How much money was he likely to have at the end of the month? Could he cut back on work and have more fun – or did he need to increase his hours to pay the bills? At age 20, he founded Loot to create a better banking experience that used data in a smarter way. In episode 232 of FinTech Insider, Ollie, CEO of Loot, shares the story behind his company, including how he got bank execs to talk to him when he was still in school.

The 11:FS research team is in the midst of building out an internal platform that has some elements of gamification (and because we see a lot of products coming through our benchmarking tool 11:FS Pulse which make use of it), I’ve been spending a bit of time considering the topic.

Every Thursday, Leda Glyptis, 11:FS Chief of Staff creates #LedaWrites. This week she turns her attention to careers, indecision and the Venn diagram of doom.