IBS Intelligence Global FinTech Interviews

When it comes to Open Banking, are consumers really seeing any benefits? Brian Hanrahan, Chief Commercial Officer at Sentenial, joins the IBS Views podcast to discuss Nuapay, the Open Banking payments provider and Sentenial subsidiary, its recent partnerships, and how the public has taken advantage of Account-2-Account payments solutions during Covid-19.

The banker is dead! Long live the banker! Chirag Patel believes the ‘traditional’ banker is no longer viable in an era where banking innovation can transform economies. He believes that the new banker must be a product-led technology enthusiast… and he’s walking the walk, having moved from ecommerce behemoth Amazon to Santander, one of the oldest financial institutions in the world.

Thomas Schumann Water Risk Indices are the first-ever index family specifically designed to minimise water risk in equities. This first iteration of the index was initially a collaboration with three FinTechs: Equarius Risk Analytics, Fuzzy Logix, and C8 Technologies. Subsequent to the preliminary index development, institutional index experts Anatase were brought in to re-engineer the index methodology and the final TSC Water Risk Indices were launched on 4 January, 2021. Robin Amlot discussed the first generation of the index with Thomas Schumann, Founder of Thomas Schumann Capital and Jonathan Webb, COO of C8 Technologies.

Banks will need to be as agile as FinTechs in the future. Retail banking is likely to be virtual post-Covid-19 but, warns Matt Locsin of Publicis Sapient, banks face a particular challenge in the threat of disintermediation by tech companies that could see revenue from fees shrinking and traditional bases of differentiation, other than price, disappearing.

The key to success in private banking is client engagement. In the face of the Covid-19 pandemic that has put pressure on institutions to use digital channels in a more effective manner to maintain the personal customer experience. The onus is on private bankers to adapt accordingly.

One of the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic has been to increase the risk of money laundering through cross-border correspondent banking. Banks are reliant on counterparties to determine account owners and monitor transactions for risk – with variable results! Mark Gazit, CEO of Israeli cybersecurity firm ThetaRay warns that existing AML systems may not be up to the task of identifying new types of money laundering activity.

Have we learnt anything from previous crises? With focus on resiliency and business continuity at an all-time high, Brian Collings, CEO of Torstone Technology, discusses what it’s like to provide post-trade solutions in a Covid-19 environment, and which lessons the financial sector has picked up from the global financial crisis in 2008.

VMware has released research showing an increase in both cyberattack volume and breaches during the past 12 months in the UK. The research was supplemented with a survey on the impact of Covid-19 on the attack landscape. According to the supplemental survey, 92% of UK cybersecurity professionals said attack volumes have increased as more employees work from home and 93% said their organisations have experienced cyberattacks linked to Covid-19 malware.

In recent months there has been a shift in investors’ attitude towards cryptoassets with major hedge funds and banks moving into Bitcoin. Central bankers are also investigating digital currencies. Copper Technologies CEO Dmitry Tokarev discusses how crypto can and is moving into mainstream financial services.

FinTech start-up Shaparency completed fund-raising in less than three months and, having launched, describes itself as a disruptive RegTech platform, which aims to increase the efficiency of board and shareholder operations. It uses blockchain technology to provide an integrated digital platform so that businesses may run board meetings and shareholder meetings remotely.