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FinTech Weekly Magazine

  • Cryptocurrency Accounting Guide: How Do I calculate My Crypto Gains?

    The increased interest and excitement towards cryptocurrencies has resulted in an influx of new money flowing into the cryptocurrency market. However, entering into the crypto world is extremely intimidating, especially when you’re dealing with a subject matter that is technically complex. With many making a considerable rate or return on their investments, it is vital to understand how we should value our crypto gains (or losses).

  • Bitcoin is just the tip of the iceberg: exploring blockchain’s full potential

    If there is one topic setting tongues wagging in FinTech, it is blockchain. Because of its distributed ledger system, Blockchain makes processes easier, faster and by extension, cheaper. Bitcoin is only one case among the many applications of crypto. Once its potential is fully explored, blockchain could generate much more than digital money, and empower individuals by putting them in full control of their money and transactions.

  • Open Banking – Intellectual Property Considerations

    On 13 January 2018, the starting pistol was fired for the Open Banking race. Retail banks (and building societies) are now required, with their customers’ consent, to provide access to their customers’ banking data to approved third parties in a standardised, straightforward and secure way. Open Banking has been hailed as a catalyst for the Fintech sector, facilitating innovative new banking apps and services for consumers and small businesses.

  • How big data and AI has revolutionized financial trading

    Many banking and finance companies have already taken advantage of big data analytics to simplify the process of personalized offers, targeted cross sales and to improve their customer service. The term big data keeps expanding and today incorporates numerous new meanings, such as Deep Learning, Cluster Analysis, Neuron Networks and Artificial Intelligence.

  • The role of blockchain in the Open Banking era 


    PSD2 - the second Payment Services Directive - offers European consumers significant control over the use of their personal financial data. But while they trust their banks with this sensitive data, a recent Accenture study shows that consumers are overwhelmingly reluctant to share their bank details with third-parties. So how can fintech companies generate trust and encourage consumers to sign-up? I believe empowering consumers to manage their own data could be the answer.

  • A Cautionary Tale for Tokens

    As the digital asset community tries to project how the world’s governments and agencies will ultimately regulate the cascade of coins and tokens now being blockchained into existence, we could use a good anecdote. Do we have a relatively recent story that features large quantities of regulatory uncertainty, customer frenzy and start-up obsession? One that might illuminate basic truths that help token investors and issuers navigate the unusual regulatory landscape they find themselves trying to cross? In fact we do. The story of daily fantasy sports companies during the second half of 2015 offers the digital asset community several valuable insights.

  • Mobile Payment: NFC, QR Codes, In-app and beyond…

    ‘Mobile payments’ is a broad term. As the ecosystem has developed, various new technologies have emerged to change the way we act and transact in-store.

  • Navigating Cryptocurrency Regulation: Common Sense in an Uncommon Industry

    The recent, exponential growth of bitcoin, Ether, and other cryptocurrencies has brought cryptocurrencies firmly into the public eye. Some have created crypto-products or tokens to raise funds in a veritable cash grab with little foresight, planning, or disclosure. Others – by the tens and hundreds of thousands – are signing up to purchase crypto-assets. Often these purchasers have no understanding of the underlying technology or the risks involved, proving that, as Mark Twain opined, “common sense is very uncommon.”

  • PSP ecosystem explained and global mapping of key players

    As the PSP segment in the payments value chain is maturing, retail prices for online payments are steadily dropping, while the level of service offered to merchants is only increasing. Consequently, players aim to gain scale and increase capabilities through strategic acquisitions. This report describes the global PSP space today and defines the capabilities offered by the different participants in the ecosystem.

  • Cryptocurrencies – Does the Next Big Thing have Staying Power?

    Cryptocurrencies – not just bitcoin, but any of the hundreds of different currencies that have been created using blockchain technology – have caught the imagination of the public. There are, seemingly, daily articles that predict either the demise of all traditional currencies in favor of cryptocurrencies, and just as many articles predicting the demise of cryptocurrencies.

  • Fintech perspective: the best is yet to come

    In the past 18 months a great many column inches have been given over to distributed ledger technology, more commonly known as blockchain and its power to disrupt industries, particularly in the financial sector.

  • Managing Identities Online: Blockchain and AI are the Key

    Blockchain and identity management are not only a natural fit, but will also be an increasingly important part for online businesses in the future. AI and Blockchain will play crucial roles in customer onboarding and provide better conversion for businesses and more security for all parties involved.

  • How Online Identification Will Change Businesses – Rupert Spiegelberg and Armin Bauer, IDnow

    FinTech Weekly talked to online identification provider IDnow about why identity management will be one of the most interesting areas to watch in 2018. Further, we discussed their highly interesting business, how opening bank accounts online can be safer than in a bank, and how even customers of 102 years old can use online identification.

  • Building the fintech hub – Interview with N26's Head of International Markets, Alexander Weber

    FinTech Weekly interviewed Alexander Weber, Head of International Markets at mobile bank N26. We briefly talked about their market expansion to the UK and US, building the fintech hub through partnerships with incumbents and fintechs and why N26 does not fear the tech giants in banking.

  • Bridging Cryptocurrency with the Travel Industry

    “The 90s had dotcom mania. Here comes crypto mania!”
    While Bitcoin is conquering new highs in the 20,000 range, and global public attention is glued to the charts of altcoins of all types, opinions have split: from baby boomer’s claiming cryptocurrency a gigantic bubble, to millennials hoping to hedge against political and economic fluctuations.

  • Blockchain Trends to Keep on Your Radar for 2018

    Blockchain is for sure a disruptive technology, and there are some trends you should consider for the next year.

  • Blockchain could disrupt credit agencies all over the world

    Blockchain is driving a paradigm shift in how we deal with data, rewriting the rulebook around approaches to data management, transparency and ownership. While digital finance is cutting the cost of serving the underbanked to drive financial inclusion, blockchain could offer a way of widening access to even greater numbers of consumers excluded from mainstream financial services.

  • ICOs: Regulatory Landscape and Good Practices

    An increased scrutiny of initial coin offerings (ICOs) shows that a professionalization of the ICO process is urgently needed.

  • The blossoming relationship between PE investors and FinTech start-ups

    Private Equity (PE) houses completed a record number of investments in FinTech portfolio companies in 2015 according to Pitchbook, marking a 79% increase on the 53 FinTech deals completed by PE firms three years earlier. Since 2015, PE firms have continued to invest in FinTech with the likes of BlackFin Capital Partners and Finstar Financial Group setting the benchmark by investing considerable amounts in the FinTech start-up market. Despite the recent decline in PE investment generally and the economic uncertainty following the Brexit vote, the FinTech start-up industry may be poised to continue its lucrative rise.

  • 2018 Lending Predictions – A New Game Awaits

    Digital fluency and a thirst for convenience are making the UK’s borrowers more capricious and cost-sensitive than ever. Interest rate rises, and new regulations will add fuel to this fire next year, and lenders that can’t keep up will get burned in 2018.

  • CTO Insights: PIN-on-Mobile is coming

    Imagine taking a regular smartphone and turning it into a payment acceptance device with a simple app download. That’s the utopian dream many companies are chasing today and it could bring huge benefits to the payments ecosystem, merchants and consumers as card and mobile payments continue to grow.

  • Cryptocurrencies and ICOs – A Rough Guide to Regulation

    Over the past few years there has been a growing proliferation of cryptocurrencies. More recently, companies which may have limited access to fundraising through traditional methods are turning to cryptocurrencies, and initial coin offering (“ICO”), as a means to raise funds.

  • Will the overnight millionaire become an overnight pauper?

    Someone who invested just USD 1,000 in bitcoin in 2010 will now have a net worth of USD 70 million. With predictions that bitcoin’s value will jump up to USD 50,000, more and more “investors” are jumping on the cryptocurrency bandwagon in a bid to benefit from the “mysterious” cryptocurrency’s phenomenal climb in value.

  • Managing the risk and reward of PSD2

    Banks and financial services institutions are preparing for a shake-up, with the new payments services directive (known as PSD2) coming into force in a matter of months. The rules are set to transform the payments and banking industries, bringing exciting new opportunities for fintech, along with strict new requirements and responsibilities. Here, we outline the key changes to be aware of.