Karsten Wenzlaff, Advisor
August 26th, 2025
Karsten Wenzlaff is a Crowdfunding and Fintech Expert from Germany. He is Secretary-General of Digit[...]
Category Archives: Research
OSFI and GRI report: AI in Finance Needs Safeguards, Explainability Key For Trust
OSFI | Release | Apr 17. 2023
Image: Unsplash/Hitesh Choudhary
The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) and the Global Risk Institute (GRI) today jointly released a report on the ethical, legal, and financial implications of artificial intelligence (AI) on financial services institutions.
- OSFI and GRI formed the Financial Industry Forum on Artificial Intelligence (FIFAI) to discuss the application of AI in Canada's financial services industry. The discussions led to the development of guiding principles called the EDGE principles, which focus on Explainability, Data, Governance, and Ethics. These principles aim to promote a responsible and accountable culture around AI usage, enable customers to understand AI conclusions, and encourage consideration of broader societal impacts.
- Explainability: Explaining AI models is essential from the outset, and clear use case and governance frameworks are required to ensure transparency. In high-impact scenarios, inherently explainable models may be preferred.
- Data: The integration of AI into financial institutions' operations has presented new challenges for managing and utilizing data. Financial institutions must align their business and data strategies to ensure that they are collecting, managing, and analyzing the right data to support their goals. Good data governance can ensure data accuracy, consistency, and completeness.
- Governance: Holistic and flexible governance frameworks are essential for effective AI model governance, with a clear risk appetite and multi-disciplinary approach. Governance should also be part of a risk-based culture, not a rote exercise.
- Ethics: Ethics is a nuanced and subjective concept, and there is not a universal definition of fairness. Bias is sometimes desired in certain use cases, such as pricing policies or risk stratification. Data used for AI training can be the source of bias and unfair outcomes. Organizations should maintain transparency and disclose how they ensure high ethical standards for their AI models.
See: Lex Fridman: Interview with Sam Altman, CEO OpenAI on the Future of Artificial Intelligence
- Globally, regulators are striking a balance between regulation and innovation, that is, setting robust regulations while ensuring financial institutions continue to transform and remain competitive.
- The approach to regulating AI globally varies across jurisdictions, with institutions like the Bank of England adopting a principles-based approach while other jurisdictions, like the Monetary Authority of Singapore, provide more granular prescriptive guidance.
- The insights and discussion from FIFAI are a testament to the need for collaboration and a multidisciplinary approach and have shown an appetite for continued dialogue in the Canadian financial services industry.
Peter Routledge, Superintendent of Financial Institutions:
“Recent advances in machine learning represent a great opportunity for financial organizations. However, balancing regulation and innovation is essential. While it is important to ensure financial institutions remain competitive by responsibly leveraging these innovations, the financial stability of our system and its fairness to those who use it are of the upmost importance.”
View the original release --> here
Download the 53 page PDF report 'A Canadian Perspective on Responsible AI' --> here
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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16z: 2023 State of Crypto (and Index)
16zcrypto | Daren Matsuoka, Eddy Lazzarin, Robert Hackett, Stephanie Zinn | Apr 11, 2023
Image: a16crypto
Overall, the 2023 report reflects a healthier industry than market prices may indicate, and a steady cycle of development, product launches, and ongoing innovation.
- a16crypto created the State of Crypto Index, a regularly updated and interactive index to track the industry’s growth.
- Blockchains are seeing growth in active users and engagement, with active addresses reaching an all-time high of 15 million last month. The number of active addresses has doubled in the past two years, driven by a diverse range of apps and services, including on-chain games. DeFi and NFT activity are also on the rise, with an increasing number of people purchasing NFTs in recent months. In addition, decentralized exchanges saw trading volumes exceeding $100 billion last month, marking the third consecutive month of positive growth.
- The number of active developers in the crypto industry has steadily increased over the last three years, with almost 30,000 developers contributing to or building on crypto projects last month. This trend is likely due to the influx of developers during the 2020 bull run, who are now sticking around.
See: Kaiko CEO Predicts Hong Kong as the Next Crypto Hub Due to US Crackdown
- Blockchains are scaling through innovative new approaches and technologies, with a proliferation of protocols and projects working to facilitate more transactions. "Layer 2" (L2) scaling solutions, for instance, accounted for 1.5% of the total fees paid on Ethereum last year, and now account for 7%.
- Breakthroughs in previously impractical technologies are becoming a reality, such as "zero knowledge" systems, which will unlock new blockchain scalability and privacy-protecting applications, as well as AI applications. Research, developer activity, and usage in this area are all showing positive trends.
- The U.S. is losing its lead in web. The proportion of crypto developers based in the U.S. has fallen by 26% compared to the rest of the world between 2018 and 2022. Thoughtful regulation could encourage crypto builders to innovate and grow these technologies safely in the U.S.
- Zooming out shows steady progress across key indicators, including market cap, developer activity, and funding activity over the last decade. Short-term volatility obscures the more predictable price-innovation cycle, where price swings propel new ideas forward.
Continue to the full article --> here
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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Is ChatGPT Better at Predicting Stock Prices Than Traditional Models?
Yahoo Finance | | Apr 12, 2023
Image: Unsplash/Mariia Shalabaieva
ChatGPT can't see the future, but it already has value for investors looking to predict future moves in the stock market. That's according to a new research paper published Monday in the Social Science Research Network by two University of Florida finance professors.
- The researchers fed over 50,000 news headlines to a chatbot and used sentiment analysis to determine whether the headlines were good, bad, or irrelevant for companies' stock prices. The chatbot's scores were found to have a statistically significant positive correlation with the next-day stock performance of the analyzed companies.
- The study suggests that using advanced language models, like ChatGPT, in investment decision-making can lead to more accurate predictions and enhance the performance of quantitative trading strategies.
- The study also found that ChatGPT outperformed traditional sentiment analysis methods in predicting stock market returns.
- Impact: AI tools like ChatGPT could be used to improve the stock market's efficiency by incorporating news faster into stock prices. He also said these tools could replace some investment analysts.
See: AI/ML is Essential to Driving Future Revenue and Remaining Competitive
- Cautions:
- ChatGPT, a language model based on GPT-3.5, is not connected to the internet and therefore lacks access to the latest information beyond its training cutoff in September 2021.
- This limitation hinders the model's ability to provide up-to-date insights on market trends, news, or developments that could impact investment decisions. Additionally, the model struggles with processing large texts and numerical data like accounting data.
Continue to the full article --> here
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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Empowering the Next Iteration of Consumer Finance
Medium, JC Bahr-de Stefano | Mar 31, 2023
Building the next decade of consumer finance
- Last week in Las Vegas, I had the great pleasure of moderating a panel at Fintech Meetup re: building the next decade of consumer finance by leveraging real-time data and cash flow forecasting. I wanted to share some of the key insights shared during the session by our amazing panelists, Jose Bethancourt (Co-Founder of Method Financial), Ema Rouf (Co-Founder of Pave.dev), and Zane Salim (Co-Founder of Atlas)!
See: CFPB Issues a Request For Information on “Data brokers”
- 1/ Alternative data augments FICO across the entire credit spectrum — this is about FICO+ NOT replacing FICO.
- The problem of credit invisibility in the US is growing, with an estimated 28 million adult Americans credit invisible and 21 million unscorable. To make decisions about these consumers and offer them financial services and products, alternative data, such as income and employment, can be used. This data can also help lenders make better risk-weighted decisions for many segments of users, not just credit invisible ones, and is particularly important during periods of economic stress.
- 2/ Real time data powers better products and outcomes by enabling greater access and improving the quality of risk management.
- Credit bureaus can take up to 45 days to report data, so lenders may not have the most up-to-date information on a borrower's behavior. Atlas, a payroll-powered credit card, uses real-time data to monitor users' financial health and adjust credit limits, allowing for better risk management and loss prevention.
- 3/ The movement to make alternative data mainstream has to happen outside of the credit bureaus.
- Credit reports do not provide a complete view of a consumer's debt obligations as there is a lot of data that is not furnished to the credit bureaus, including most BNPL loans. However, companies like Method collect data from over 60k institutions to provide lenders with a more comprehensive view of a person's debt obligations, combining data from credit bureaus with financial institutions' core banking systems.
See: Canada’s Open Banking Journey: Interview with Abe Karar, Chief Product Officer, Fintech Galaxy
- 4/ Recent innovation in infrastructure has made this data far more accessible than it has been in the past.
- Recent advancements in infrastructure and tools have made it easier to access and enrich the data. Companies such as Method and Pave are providing infrastructure that helps fintechs and banks adopt and use this data, leading to accelerated adoption.
- 5/ Mature lenders don’t want scores, they want raw data or attributes.
- Understanding the data is crucial for them to explain it to originating banks or capital providers, and the use of attribute generation can speed up model development. Pave is an example of a company offering transaction cleaning, enrichment, and their own attributes toolbox for lenders to use in their proprietary models.
Continue to the full article --> here
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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Efficiency: The Key to Success for Rapidly Growing Fintech Companies
Image: Unsplash/Suzanne D. Williams
Flagship Advisory Partners | Joel Van Arsdale, Pedro Giesta, and Francesca De Fina | Mar 16, 2023
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- The Good: 13 companies in our total sample (50) delivered a Gross Profit Growth / Opex Growth ratio greater than 2
- The Bad: 4 companies in our total sample (50) delivered an Opex Growth / Gross Profit Growth ratio between 1.5 and 2.0
- The Ugly: 3 companies in our total sample (50) delivered negative gross profit growth and 7 companies in our total sample delivered an Opex Growth / Gross Profit Growth ratio greater than 2.0.
See: Some Exciting Fintech Stats (2023-2025)
Continue to the full article --> here
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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Exploring How Paid Surveys Impact Hardware Engineering
Guest Post | April 10, 2023
Image: Unsplash/ThisisEngineering RAEng
Do you ever wonder how your voice is influencing the hardware engineering industry? Everything from products to services relies on consumer feedback to some extent. However, paid surveys can gather data in a way that is much more accurate and helpful.
We all know that companies need feedback to make their products better, and questionnaires are one way they can get it. By taking a look at how paid surveys are impacting the hardware engineering industry, you'll get a better understanding of how companies use this information and what your responses could mean for the future of tech. So what are paid surveys, and how do they influence the industry?
An Overview of Hardware Engineering
Hardware engineering is a complex and advanced area of engineering that focuses on the design and production of physical machinery, equipment, and computer components. To become a successful hardware engineer, one must have an understanding of both computer science and electrical engineering.
At its core, hardware engineering encompasses the development of prototypes, circuit boards, sensors, processors, and other physical technology components. It's essential to understand how these elements interact with different operating systems in order to generate the desired results.
One way in which hardware engineers gather feedback about their work is through paid surveys. Paid surveys provide critical insight into how user experiences can be improved or modified to increase user satisfaction with a given product or application. The results from these surveys then help engineers determine the changes that need to happen in order to create better hardware components.
Why Paid Surveys Are Helpful to Hardware Engineering?
Surveys for cash play an essential role in the hardware engineering industry. By seeking feedback from users through surveys, companies are able to amass a better understanding of how people use and interact with their products. This data is highly valuable when it comes to informing decisions on product design, feature development, and marketing tactics.
For example, surveys can provide insights into which features customers find most useful and which could use improvement. Companies can also use the study results to determine the best types of user interfaces for their products and how to price them competitively. Surveys are also helpful in gathering feedback on performance and other operational issues.
Ultimately, paid surveys provide valuable information that can serve product and service optimization for users. They help companies gain a better understanding of potential markets and trends. By incorporating this feedback into their work, hardware engineers can create better user experiences for everyone involved.
How Paid Surveys Impact the Design Process?
The design stage is where everything starts. From concept development to market research, paid surveys can help engineers understand customer needs and preferences to create better products. For example, collecting feedback on product ideas early on can help identify potential issues or problems before they become too expensive to fix. Plus, online surveys make gathering feedback from customers of all ages and backgrounds easy as they take advantage of today’s connected world.
Once the product is ready for the market, surveys can help with quality control. This added step can reduce defects by properly testing incoming parts and components from suppliers across multiple locations. Paid surveys are also useful when companies need to quickly gather data on customer satisfaction while users try the product in real-world situations.
Thanks to paid surveys, hardware engineers have access to data that helps them create better products faster and more efficiently, helping them stay ahead of their competition.
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More Accurate Data
Using paid surveys to obtain feedback from customers and stakeholders results in much more accurate data since it is motivated by financial rewards. This takes into account many different perspectives, giving the engineers a better chance of producing great products that meet customer needs.
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Bigger Pool and Better Insights
The use of paid surveys also helps to get acuities into customers’ mindsets and buying behavior from a larger population, thus giving engineers an indication of what type of features to incorporate into their hardware. This results in products that are more efficient and impactful.
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Better Decision-Making
Paid surveys also provide valuable feedback on existing products, which helps engineers identify problems in their current designs and act upon them quickly to make necessary changes to improve customer satisfaction. All this leads to better decision-making in terms of product design as well as marketing investments.
Start Using Paid Surveys for Better Hardware Engineering
Paid surveys offer a unique opportunity to understand the opinions of the mass population on various topics.
See: Leger Survey: More Education is Required to Increase Awareness of Fintech Adoption in Canada
By going to the ground and spending time to get the answers, engineering teams can collaborate on a better product and better understand what the customer wants. This level of insight can create high-quality products that perform, ultimately leading to increased customer satisfaction.
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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NFX: A Founder’s Guide to Crafting Compelling Investor Updates in Tough Times
NFX | Apr 6, 2023
Your communication style, especially during challenging times, says a lot about what kind of leader you are out on the battlefield – and your investor updates will be a leading indicator of your success.
- An exceptional founder can often be identified by their communication rituals, which are evident in their interactions with their teams, customers, and investors. Learning to send world-class investor updates is one of the most valuable rituals that can be adopted.
- Effective communication is crucial because the right investors can be powerful allies, but only if trust is built through clear communication during good times and even more so during challenging times. Therefore, mastering the art of communication can greatly benefit a founder's success.
- In late March 2023, NFX surveyed 870+ founders in our broader network (not necessarily NFX portfolio companies) to find out how they were doing after the SVB banking crisis, and in the downturn more generally. That data reveals the communication habits of seed-stage founders who have raised $1M or more:
- 60% communicate with their investors monthly.
- 21% say they communicate weekly.
- 3% communicate daily.
- And 16% only communicate with their investors on a quarterly basis.
See: How Top CEOs Set the Stage for Growth
- Common mistakes when updating founders:
- #1 Don't go AWOL: You’d be surprised by how many founders get too busy to update their investors, and then turn up asking for money when their backs are against a wall. Radio silence gives investors time to ruminate, or wonder why [they] are not hearing from you. [They] will assume the worst if they don’t hear anything. Blindspots breed mistrust.
- #2 Don't sit on bad news: Communicate swiftly and honestly, especially when something bad happens. Don’t be afraid to seek feedback. It’s highly possible that your investors will eventually learn, either by deduction or from someone else in their network, that something is amiss. Make sure they hear it from you first.
- #3 Not having a good investor template: having a template brings you incredible speed. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel for each update.
- Executive summary: highlights, lowlights, KPIs, requests, runway
- Main update: All KPIs, achievements, challenges, asks, plans
- Nice to have's (depending): new key hires, notable news, thanks
- #4 Not having enough data
- #5 Not acknowledging feedback: When your investors give you feedback, make it a priority. Even if you disagree with it, acknowledge it, deal with it fast, or at least set expectations around when you will deal with it.
Continue to the full article --> here
The National Crowdfunding & Fintech Association (NCFA Canada) is a financial innovation ecosystem that provides education, market intelligence, industry stewardship, networking and funding opportunities and services to thousands of community members and works closely with industry, government, partners and affiliates to create a vibrant and innovative fintech and funding industry in Canada. Decentralized and distributed, NCFA is engaged with global stakeholders and helps incubate projects and investment in fintech, alternative finance, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer finance, payments, digital assets and tokens, blockchain, cryptocurrency, regtech, and insurtech sectors. Join Canada's Fintech & Funding Community today FREE! Or become a contributing member and get perks. For more information, please visit: www.ncfacanada.org
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