A new economy is emerging driven by changes in technology, demographics and the environment. The UK is also undergoing several major transitions that finance has to respond to.
Category Archives: Digital, NEO and Open Banking
Fintech Investor Interview: Rob Antoniades, General Partner of Information Venture Partners
Information Venture Partners | Rob Antoniades | August 1, 2019
Intro: NCFA Fintech Confidential spoke with some of Canada’s experienced fintech investors, on their background, how Canada has evolved, what we should be doing, advice to fintech founders and what keeps them awake at night. This is part 4 of a 4 part series.
What is your background, and why did you start Information Venture Partners?
I have operated VC groups or offices for several banks including CIBC, BMO and then RBC. My finance experience prior to running these VC operations, was heavily influenced by my time in equity capital markets and included equity research, sales and trading, investment and merchant banking. These experiences have helped me tremendously as a Fintech investor. I have lived some of the challenges that we are trying to solve. I co-founded (with David Unsworth) Information Venture Partners to fill a void in the market to fund companies developing technologies relevant for financial services.
How have you seen the Canadian fintech ecosystem change in the past 5 years? How has the Canadian fintech ecosystem evolved?
The Canadian Fintech ecosystem has changed tremendously over the past 5 years, for the better. We are still transitioning as an industry, from very early stage, mostly first-time entrepreneurs 5 years ago or prior, to a more mature ecosystem with companies now generating 8 figures of revenue, some repeat entrepreneurs, and yet still a vibrant start-up ecosystem.
See: Peer to Peer Lending: The Future of Fintech is Now
How can we strengthen and grow the Canadian fintech ecosystem?
The easiest way to build the ecosystem is to concentrate our efforts, of the industry (broadly defined), to supporting domestic Fintechs. For example, our financial institutions spend billions on information technology and if concentrated on Canadian companies, would accelerate the development of the Canadian Fintech community. Clearly, there would be no expectation that these institutions support disruptive and disintermediating Fintechs.
What advise would you give to Canadian fintechs competing globally?
Canadian Fintech companies need to understand that they can start in Canada, and if they have traction here, this momentum can be leveraged with FIs globally. Our financial system and institutions are highly regarded globally. We can leverage that advantage.
However, in the absence of such a beachhead, there are thousands of customer opportunities around the world. If your solution addresses a common pain point, you can just as easily build a company with lead customers from virtually any part of the world. The entrepreneurs need to have that global mindset.
What keeps you awake at night?
Insomnia, joint pains and the recurring thought that we, as a nation, have not developed a unified strategy to develop our nation as a leading fintech hub, in the global context.
We as cities or regions, have generally not rallied around local champions, and we as a nation have not developed a coherent strategy. Can it be done without a strategy? Absolutely, but it would be exponentially more powerful, quicker, and likely successful, if we had the financial and moral support of the ecosystem including all levels of government, industry, capital providers, advisors and entrepreneurs.
See: Form Fintech & Holt Accelerator Create Map of Canadian FinTech Ecosystem
This strategy would build on local strengths, be minimally competitive between the centres, and not too difficult to execute if we had a champion, with capital and a willingness to make a few mistakes in order to accelerate the advancement of the cause.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
There has never been a better time to be a Fintech entrepreneur in Canada, at least not in the 20+ years that I have been involved in the sector.
Robert Antoniades, General Partner and Co-Founder, Information Venture Partners
Robert Antoniades co-founded Information Venture Partners in 2014 with Dave Unsworth to work with startups in the field he knows best: financial services. Robert is interested in finding the disruptive ideas and entrepreneurs that believe new or better information is foundational to businesses. He believes that financial institutions need technology to service their customers, reduce cost and compete. Some of his main areas of interest include SaaS, next generation analytics including artificial intelligence and machine learning, capital markets, banking, wealth management and insurance technology.
More Canadian Fintech Investor Interviews in this 4 part series:
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Part 1: Karim Gillani, General Partner, Luge Capital
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Part 2: Christian Lassonde, Founder & Managing Partner, Impression Ventures
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Part 3: Peggy Van De Plassche, Founding Partner, Roar VC
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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The Case for Open Banking: Benefiting The Underserved
Progressa | Philipp Postrehovsky | July 31, 2019
The Open Banking Opportunity
The consumer owns their financial data, not the bank.
B2B: Fintech companies are able to securely access a consumer’s financial information without having to use third party services like Decision Logic.
B2C: More options to shop and compare products, achieving the best products and rates. More educated and active financial service consumers.
Benefits
- In the open banking era, you’re linked into alternative sources of value and not being driven by a closed ecosystem/closed banking monopoly which restricts the consumer to access resources they need.
- Consumers can get the help they need in a streamlined manner when going through challenging financial times.
- Banks can migrate risk to fintech companies and fintechs can provide more diverse financial services and advice to better serve the consumers.
See: Open banking data tapped to speed up laundering checks
Risks & Mitigation
- To ensure the protection of customer data, stringent compliance standards need be implemented along with regular compliance verification.
- Any security breach or misuse of data could significantly harm the banks’ brand reputation and confidence they currently hold, which would instantly jeopardize the program.
- The Government needs to play a leadership role to mandate and enforce standards in order to create a unified vision.
Some Inspiration: The Airline Industry
Travellers historically were required to contact incumbent airline companies directly in order to book or manage reservations, check availability, check in, and check arrival times. Modern standards in our airline industry placed the customers in control and enabled customers to decide what, when, where, and how they wished to consume airline services. This amounted to expanded and improved services for the would-be travellers. The modernization of the travel industry allowed for open functionality through secure APIs. This re-visioning of the industry enabled customers and third-party apps to perform most, if not all of the travel functions, without the need to ever contact the airline through slow, analogue channels.
Open Banking has Already Arrived Overseas
Open banking would position us as a global leader alongside the European Union and UK. PSD2 (Payment Services Directive 2) arrived in Europe last January, forcing European banks’ to open up their API’s to fintech and other financial companies.
Our Stance
The democratization of personal banking data while maintaining the highest level of security means happier consumers. Progressa fully supports open banking, but companies need to be prepared to take on the responsibility of it. Canada’s current ecosystem is not prepared for open banking and it will take several years to become a reality.
Philipp Postrehovsky – SVP Marketing, Progressa
Philipp is a product visionary, brand builder and an award-winning marketer who has been involved in the Vancouver tech scene for over 15 years. In 2013 he co-founded RentMoola, which continues to be one of North America's leading fintech companies with the mission to eliminate the rent cheque and modernize rent collection for the enterprise. Before that, he was a brand leader for Mogo Technologies and Wonga Canada and began his career at Electronic Arts. He is the founder of Grind For Kids, a program that raised over $1 million for BC Children’s Hospital Foundation and sits on the Board of one of BC’s top independent schools.
You may also like:
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Open Banking: What’s Really at Stake
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Open banking in Canada – time to prepare for change
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Canada’s financial upstarts are lining up behind open banking, but bigger players may need con
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Why Open Banking Represents a Seismic Shift for Fintech
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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The future of finance: Insights into tomorrow’s financial system
Deloitte UK Financial Services | July 31, 2019
Financial services continue to go through major disruptive changes that are redefining their role and structure. Recognising this, the Bank of England (BoE) launched an initiative on the “Future of finance”. Ahead of the publication of the conclusions of the BoE’s initiative, Deloitte UK considered the current focus in financial services and what the future will look like.
Technology: How can technology enable cheaper, better and faster provision of financial services and improve the efficiency of markets?
The major changes in technology are being driven by: customer expectations; competition and margin pressures; the availability of greater computing power (including through Cloud computing); the ability to draw customer and market insight from structured and unstructured data using artificial intelligence ; and the willingness of customers to engage with digital interfaces.
This has refocussed attention in two key areas – the industry-wide opportunities to reduce friction and challenges arising from the way new technologies are deployed within firms.
The future of finance is expected to be on-demand and flexible with firms offering tailored products on a point‑in‑time basis and enabling customers to switch between providers and products seamlessly. This will accelerate the expansion of platform-based financial services, where all customer interaction is consolidated in one interface or platform. Firms and the governments will also increasingly explore the role of utility-based functions (for areas such as Know Your Customer and onboarding requirements) to reduce customer friction and costs.
See: The future of finance report
One of the inherent challenges with increased automation is the significant increase in speed and potential lack of transparency around decision making and related controls. How firms govern these innovative technological solutions, and identify and manage risks, from the design stage through to execution and post-deployment, is a challenge for them, and will be an area of focus for regulators.
In addition to reviewing the regulatory perimeter, regulators are expected to experiment with innovation themselves specifically in areas such as regulatory reporting, market surveillance and enforcement. In the longer term, the ability to interrogate and draw insight from firm and market level data at a granular level will have a significant influence on supervision, enforcement and policy development.
Low-carbon economy: How can finance support the transition to a low-carbon world?
The major changes under way in the low-carbon economy are being driven by: rise of new technologies, increasing pressure from customers, and increasing regulatory response to the financial risks posed by climate change.
The transition to a low-carbon world in the future will need to be accelerated by the access of financial services to “green” data. Therefore, for financial markets to work efficiently, new third parties will emerge to provide estimates of firms’ carbon footprint based on a stream of different data sources (e.g., satellite data, market sentiment and disclosures could be overlaid). In addition, financial services will (need to) think about what role they can play in reducing their customers’ carbon impact. As such, financial services firms may increasingly include a penalty factor or an incentive factor as part of the terms on which they provide finance to both business and personal borrowers. This will ultimately help reduce the inequality of carbon consumption across end users.
See: The Future of Government… in a Digital Age
The key challenges will be for financial services firms to ensure a shared understanding of the low-carbon strategy across product development, risk management and sustainability teams. In addition, firms will need to boost their climate change scenario analysis capabilities (e.g., by exploring foresight over forecast) so as to price the climate change externality. As some “brown” firms will continue to exist, another key challenge will be for financial services to assess the utility of “brown” firms – in addition to their cost and carbon-efficiency.
Regulators will need to accelerate this transition by helping financial markets measure “green” data by framing and standardising it in order to allocate resources efficiently.
Emerging markets: How can we facilitate the increasing integration of emerging markets into the global financial system?
Major changes are under way in emerging markets, driven by the rising share of global growth that they account for (forecasted to grow to almost 65% of global GDP by 2022).
The BoE expects that deeper global financial partnerships with emerging economies” will be the most important drivers of global growth in the decades ahead.”
As capital flows between developed and emerging markets increase, financial activity will naturally follow. Emerging markets will become better integrated into the global financial system through a combination of increased issuer participation, broader investor base and improved market access and efficiency. This integration is likely to lead to greater market liquidity and lower capital costs, and will present investors with new opportunities for investments and risk-sharing.
See:
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Open banking in Canada – time to prepare for change
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Singapore topples United States as world’s most competitive economy
Regulators will need to ensure that this ever-greater integration is matched by increasing integration of rules and standards, and supervisory oversight. There is of course precedent for cross-border cooperation, but for a variety of reasons it is less well established with many of these economies. A plan announced by the UK government in May to expand a programme that sends BoE officials to help emerging economies reform their financial sectors is an example of how this cooperation will be built. The agreement between the UK Financial Conduct Authority and Chinese Securities Regulatory Commission on the "Shanghai-London Stock Connect", which will support mutual access to each country’s capital markets gives an indication of how integration may developed.
The BoE (as the central bank) will also play a role in developing infrastructure to support cross-border capital flows in the currencies of emerging markets. Analysis also points to emerging market debt and equity funds being more responsive to prices falls than advanced economy funds, with implications for financial stability. Authorities in the UK are considering system-wide stress scenarios and macro prudential tools.
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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Open banking in Canada – time to prepare for change
The Sixty Percent | Dan Smith, Editor | July 30, 2019
As legislators tentatively prepare to adopt open banking, what are the opportunities and who are the beneficiaries of a new financial rulebook?
Open banking is on its way to Canada, representing a major opportunity for the region’s fintechs. In September 2018, the Department of Finance created a committee to advise on the pros and cons of opening up consumer financial services. Its report was published in January and, despite raising concerns around the privacy of consumers’ data, is largely receptive to the concept.
At iwoca, where we provide fast, flexible business loans for SMEs, open banking has been an important part of our growth. Canada’s fintechs should prepare for the opportunity.
So, what is open banking?
In Europe, the open banking regulation PSD2 (Revised Payment Service Directive) came into effect in 2015. This set of rules was designed to break the hegemony of the established European banks and welcome innovative new players to the industry, while making electronic payments safer and more secure.
Under this framework, in 2016 the UK forced its biggest banks (Allied Irish Bank, Bank of Ireland, Barclays, Danske Bank, HSBC, Lloyds, Nationwide, RBS and Santander) to allow fintech startups access to their customers’ data, when requested by the consumer.
What does this mean on the ground?
At iwoca open banking allows us to make better credit decisions for the benefit of our customers. We can now access several years of an applicant’s financial statements direct from their bank, and as a result make highly accurate credit decisions.
Elsewhere in the UK, newcomer banks, such as Monzo and Starling are thriving by offering slick apps that help people manage their money more easily. Financial planning platform Finimize is providing millenials with a low-cost alternative to a financial advisor. Investment platform Nutmeg is democratising wealth management, helping people invest with as little as £100.
For Canadian firms looking to benefit from any forthcoming rule changes, there are plenty of areas to explore. With greater access to transaction and statement data, fintechs have more information about their customers. This will make easier for them to offer tailored products for individual customers, manage risk with greater accuracy, identify customers to onboard, offer money management solutions, and collaborate with other players in the industry.
A word of warning
But that’s not to say the introduction of open banking will result in success for all of the industry’s players. Much of the opportunities available to tech firms are also available to incumbent banks, which are well respected by the Canadian public. The established giants have the advantage of strong brands and significant resources to throw at developing new tools and services. Taking them on won’t be easy.
See: Open Banking: What’s Really at Stake
In addition, any legislation would likely involve the loosening of red tape in some areas and tightening in others. Fintechs must therefore innovate with care. People’s money and financial data is a sensitive area, so accounting errors, data breaches and other lapses of trust can have a major impact on a fledgling company’s reputation.
Consumers will not stand by firms who are seen as irresponsible with their financial records.
What’s the score elsewhere?
Open banking is being roll-out around the world, with several other markets poised to implement it in some form. Hong Kong, Japan, Israel, Australia, Mexico and New Zealand are all researching the area, conducting pilot schemes and drafting potential rules to implement in coming years.
It’s an exciting time to be in financial technology, with amazing opportunities to innovate and build new products. At iwoca we aim to keep our customers at the centre of everything we do. Afterall, success in the open banking landscape depends on providing a valuable, high quality service – it’s what the initiative was designed to do.
Read more from iwoca at The Sixty Percent
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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Peer to Peer Lending: The Future of Fintech is Now
Lending Loop | Reza Jafer | July 24, 2019
Peer-to-peer lending is on the rise. It is steadily growing and becoming an increasingly significant part of financial services in the UK, US and Australia, among other countries. With an emphasis on speed and transparency, these platforms are addressing the needs of investors and small businesses by reducing bureaucracy and administration costs to offer better interest rates to both groups.
According to an article published on TechBullion, peer-to-peer lending is attracting more investors and borrowers with the volume of loans increasing drastically on a global scale and “is predicted to come close to $1 trillion by the year 2025.” There is an increase in the volume of investors who are already experienced with peer-to-peer platforms, and the number of new investors is continually growing.
Investors’ growing demand for peer-to-peer lending platforms raises some interesting questions, regarding what makes peer-to-peer lending so different and appealing on a global scale.
What sets peer-to-peer lending apart from other fixed-income investments in Canada?
Some of the key attributes that set peer-to-peer lending apart from traditional fixed-income are the low amounts of capital needed to build diversified portfolios, the potential for higher yields, and having a direct impact on the success of businesses across Canada.
Recognizing that Small & Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) employ approximately 90% of the Canadian workforce, the shift to supporting local businesses is here to stay. Peer-to-peer lending enables everyday Canadians to invest their money locally and support communities around them, in addition to supporting local businesses through other means, like purchasing their products or services. Peer-to-peer loans offer an opportunity to invest with a conscious and purpose, without compromising returns.
Is there a reason why peer-to-peer lending is gaining so much traction in Canada?
First and foremost, it provides everyday Canadians with a unique way to diversify their financial portfolios. If you are a Canadian investor, there is a very high probability that your net worth is significantly exposed to just a few industries like financial services, natural resources, telecom and real estate. Between your employer, pension and home ownership, it is prudent to diversify your concentration to these few industries. Peer-to-peer investments are offering unprecedented access to investments that were previously only available to financial institutions and high net worth individuals. Canadians are more financially-savvy than ever, and peer-to-peer investments provide an innovative way for everyone to take control of their wealth.
See: Peer-to-peer lending will help small businesses stay afloat
Investors looking to diversify their portfolio and feel more connected with their investments should definitely consider including peer-to-peer investments in their portfolios.
What role do you think peer-to-peer will play in financial services by 2030?
In the last decade, we’ve witnessed a ‘retail revolution’ of sorts, with E-commerce juggernauts like Amazon and Alibaba changing the way consumers purchase goods. By providing consumers access to products all across the world at ever-lowering prices, long gone are the days of costly, and often redundant, intermediaries of the sales cycle. The removal of costly intermediaries isn’t exclusive to the B2C space.
It was simply a matter of time before we turned our attention to financial service providers and our investments, to re-evaluate traditional offerings. Of late, we have witnessed the popularity in democratizing access to traditional investments, like stocks and bonds, through ETFs and self-directed trading. But much of the alternative investment space is still only accessible to high-net-worth individuals or are wrapped up in age-old fund structures with high-costs in place.
Peer-to-peer investments aim to provide access to an asset class that has been traditionally held by financial institutions and it has reinvented how fixed-income investments can help Canadians build their wealth. Today, peer-to-peer is still a nascent concept in the Canadian market, but by 2030, I believe this will be the normal way of investing or borrowing. Peer-to-peer is simply a reimagination of a process, whereby we are democratizing lending and connecting Canadians with capital directly to Canadian small businesses seeking it.
See:
Would an Open Banking framework accelerate some of these changes or alter the landscape altogether?
Absolutely. For the lending sector specifically, the potential of Open Banking is significant because we often work with an underserved segment of the market. At times, it can be difficult to quantify the potential of these groups, but if the UK serves as an indicator, the economic potential in both urban and rural areas could be significant. In the UK, we see reports that peer-to-peer platforms have had a tremendous impact on job creation. While the consumer experience is a key element, the impact goes far beyond that, to the point where our government should consider how Open Banking contributes to job creation and economic growth, especially when evaluating what it could mean for Canadian consumers and businesses.
We see a huge opportunity for all of the above, especially for Canadian business owners, who would be able to receive more tailored financial service products and develop a more thorough understanding of the financing options available to them. Shifting the ownership of data to the business owner rather than the institution opens up countless new opportunities for fintech providers to offer customized solutions and services. With a scarcity of available data, the full capabilities of artificial intelligence and machine learning are not being maximized. Open Banking has the power to change this paradigm significantly.
Similarly, Open Banking would increase choice for investors and result in more investor-focused products and processes. In the UK, we’re seeing an exciting evolution of financial services and increased integration as peer-to-peer platforms like Zopa are looking to launch digital banks. They are part of a growing number of emerging challenger banks in the UK. It’s exciting to see this space grow and more competition enter the market just one year after implementation. Open Banking is clearly enabling this kind of competition in the UK and an Open Banking framework in Canada might open up similar possibilities.
We don’t have a history of challenger banks the way other jurisdictions do, but with the speed of innovation in FinTech, we might see the emergence of multiple challenger banks in a way we haven’t seen before. That’s just one piece of a much bigger picture. On a larger scale, an Open Banking framework could facilitate unprecedented innovation in Canada’s financial services sector which is essential to our prosperity and competitiveness.
Who wouldn’t want more of that?
Reza Jafer, Head of Wealth Management, Lending Loop (www.lendingloop.ca)
Reza Jafer has some insights into those very questions. As the Head of Wealth Management at Lending Loop, he oversees investor relationships and is dedicated to helping Canadians build successful, diversified portfolios. Before joining Lending Loop, Reza worked at two of the largest banks globally within their Corporate & Investment Banking divisions, focused on financing and advising some of Canada's largest companies.
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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[INVITATION] Webinar: FinTech Market and Opportunities in Hong Kong / Canadian FinTech Trade Mission to Hong Kong @ HK FinTech Week 2019
Canadian Consulate General in Hong Kong | Eunice Wong | July 16, 2019
[INVITATION] Webinar: FinTech Market and Opportunities in Hong Kong / Canadian FinTech Trade Mission to Hong Kong @ HK FinTech Week 2019
You are invited to attend a Webinar - Hong Kong FinTech Market and Opportunities on July 23, 2019 (Tuesday) 9:00AM - 10:30AM Toronto Time
Join us as we discuss the current Fintech Market in Hong Kong. This webinar will cover the following topics:
- HK Fintech Market and Ecosystem
- HK Fintech Opportunities
- HK Fintech Week 2019 as a platform
- Canadian FinTech Trade Mission to Hong Kong FinTech Week 2019
Speakers:
- Mr. Charles Ng, Associate Director-General of Investment Promotion, InvestHK
- Mr. King Leung, Head of Fintech, InvestHK
- Mr. Musheer Ahmed, General Manager, Fintech Association of Hong Kong
See: Hong Kong being pulled into the 21st Century — digital banking licenses finally arrive
Agenda:
- Event Introduction by Ellen Cao, Ontario government (10 minutes)
- Hong Kong Fintech Market by InvestHK, Mr. Charles Ng, Associate Director-General of Investment Promotion; and Mr. King Leung, Head of Fintech (30 minutes)
- Hong Kong Fintech Market by Fintech Association of Hong Kong Mr. Musheer Ahmed, General Manager (10 minutes)
- Q&A (15 minutes)
- Government of Canada's Planned Participation for Hong Kong Fintech Week by Consulate General of Canada Ms. Eunice Wong, Trade Commissioner (ICT & FinTech) (10 minutes)
For more information, please contact Eunice Wong, Consulate General of Canada Hong Kong & Macao at eunice.wong@international.gc.ca.
For registration, please email: Eunice.wong@international.gc.ca, and the sign in instruction will be sent to you.
Many thanks for your interest. Please feel free to invite your contacts who may benefit with this free event.
About Invest Hong Kong
InvestHK is the department of the Hong Kong SAR Government responsible for Foreign Direct Investment, supporting overseas, Mainland and Taiwanese businesses to set up and expand in Hong Kong. The department provides free advice and customised services to help businesses succeed in the city's economy.
About Fintech Association of Hong Kong (FTAHK)
FTAHK is an independent, not-for-profit, membership based association representing Hong Kong’s local and global FinTech community.
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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The future of finance report
Bank of England Review of UK’s financial system | By Huw van Steenis | June 20, 2019
Overview
My report, The Future of Finance , looks at how the economy is changing; how finance can serve and support these changes; and what it could mean for the Bank of England.
We have looked beyond the immediate challenges posed by the UK’s withdrawal from the EU to identify longer-term trends shaping the economy and finance — and how the Bank can support this evolution for the good of the people of the United Kingdom.
What this means for finance
Finance is likely to undergo intense change over the coming decade. The shift to digitally-enabled services and firms is already profound and appears to be accelerating.
The shift from banks to market-based finance is likely to grow further.
See:
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Tech’s raid on the banks
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EY Global FinTech Adoption Index finds over half (64%) of global consumers use FinTech
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The Roadblocks to European Fintech Expansion
Ultra low rates, new regulations and the need to invest in updating their businesses mean many UK and global banks are struggling to make their cost of capital.
Brexit and political and policy changes around the world will also impact the shape of financial services.
Risks are likely to shift.
Regulators and the private sector have to collaborate in new ways as technology breaks down barriers.
Finance is hugely important to the UK and the right infrastructure can support new finance.
What we ask the Bank of England to do
- Shape tomorrow’s payment system
- Enable innovation through modern financial infrastructure
- Support the data economy through standards and protocols
- Champion global standards for markets
- Promote the smooth transition to a low-carbon economy
- Support adaption to the needs of a changing demographic
- Safeguard the financial system from evolving risks
- Enhance protection against cyber-risks
- Embrace digital regulation
Download the 148 page PDF report --> 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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