Global

February 5, 2021 @ 7:20 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Fintech firm Ripple notes that in May 2020, McKinsey had identified that consumer and enterprise digital adoption had “matured five years, in a matter of eight weeks.” For financial institutions, digital technologies — such as Cloud-enabled models — provide the flexibility and scalability needed to… Read More

February 5, 2021 @ 11:12 am By JD Alois  |  

Better Internet Search, based in Scotland, and Partisia Blockchain, based in Denmark, have received a grant from the EU-funded Next Generation Internet Trust (NGI Trust), to develop a new alternative search engine. According to a release, the NGI Trust seeks to support the “development of… Read More

February 5, 2021 @ 10:05 am By Omar Faridi  |  

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has been carefully reviewing social media posts, as the federal regulator is looking out for any signs of potential fraud, which may have increased due to the frenzied trading of GameStop and other firms’ shares. The SEC‘s probe… Read More

February 5, 2021 @ 8:51 am By Omar Faridi  |  

Balaji S. Srinivasan, a prominent angel investor and entrepreneur, says that Fintech is “the frontend,” while crypto is like “the backend.” Balaji, the former CTO at leading digital asset exchange Coinbase, points out that Fintech and blockchain/crypto technologies have been “built mostly in parallel over… Read More

February 5, 2021 @ 8:07 am By Omar Faridi  |  

  Garrick Hileman, Head of Research at Blockchain.com and visiting fellow at the London School of Economics, says that the future “doesn’t look like Robinhood.” Hileman writes in a blog post that “disgust over GameStop’s trading shutdown” will most likely accelerate the adoption of decentralized… Read More

February 5, 2021 @ 7:52 am By Omar Faridi  |  

The team at Bondora, a European peer to peer lending platform, states that the first month of 2021 is “setting the tone” for the year to come. Bondora notes that the Fintech sector is still growing steadily. including Portugal’s financial technology industry as the country… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 10:04 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Israel-based Fintech firm PayKey has reportedly expanded its mobile keyboard system in order to allow bank clients to easily manage their investments and apply for loans from within any supported app. The PayKey team confirmed on February 2, 2021: “Today, we expanded our solution to… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 8:09 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the nation’s central bank and financial regulator, and the Singapore Exchange Regulation (SGX RegCo) have asked the general public to be on alert to the potential risks that may be involved in trading in securities incited by online discussion… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 5:34 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Digital asset exchange Coinbase recently published its Around the Block #11: “A snapshot of decentralized finance (DeFi) and two sides of the crypto regulatory spectrum” (report), which aims to cover important issues in the crypto and blockchain industry. In this latest edition, released on February… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 5:04 pm By JD Alois  |  

German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz is taking some heat from various politicians as fingers look for somewhere to point blame. Social Democrat Scholz, along with his deputy Joerg Kukies continue to deny responsibility for the collapse of Wirecard AG (WDI.F), a Fintech that was once… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 12:10 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Switzerland is currently home to around 130 startups that are actively applying blockchain or distributed ledger tech (DLT) to improve processes in the finance sector, according to new data from Swisscom. The majority of these firms (48%) offer services related to banking infrastructure, with many… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 10:56 am By Samantha Hurst  |  

  PayPal Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: PYPL) announced this week the release of its fourth quarter and full-year 2020 results. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, PayPal reported that 2020 has the strongest performance in the payment platform’s history, with Total Payment Volume (TPV) being $936 billion, growing 31%… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 9:47 am By Omar Faridi  |  

Nearly 300 SPACs are currently seeking deals with $90 billion in available cash. Fintech firm Payoneer is also planning to go public through a SPAC that will reportedly be led by Bancorp founder Betsy Cohen. Payoneer’s management noted that they intend to merge with a… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 9:16 am By JD Alois  |  

In a sign of the times, digital bank Revolut has announced that it is migrating towards permanent flexible working for the majority of its 2000 plus employees. Going forward, employees may choose where they work and if they want to come to the office. As… Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 7:52 am By Omar Faridi  |  

Switzerland-based wealth management Fintech WealthArc is reportedly planning to strengthen and expand its overseas business after acquiring over $4 million in capital. WealthArc’s Cloud-enabled platform is being used by wealth management services to access investment data that is automatically gathered and curated by AI algorithms…. Read More

February 4, 2021 @ 7:50 am By Omar Faridi  |  

Finland’s peer to peer (P2P) Bitcoin exchange, LocalBitcoins says that 2020 was an “extraordinary” year and during the past quarter (Q4 2020), the BTC price reached its all-time high and has continued to surge this year. Bitcoin (BTC) is trading at just over $38,000 at… Read More

February 3, 2021 @ 11:55 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Switzerland-based Sygnum Bank, a licensed digital asset bank founded on “Swiss and Singapore heritage” operating globally, and Fine Wine Capital, a privately-held specialist trading firm with a special focus on the fine wine market, have reportedly tokenized a range of premium investible wines. This initiative… Read More

February 3, 2021 @ 9:03 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

NPR’s Ailsa Chang recently covered the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) expected role in conducting an investigation into the Reddit / social media takeover of Wall Street. SEC Acting Chair Allison Herren Lee commented on the agency’s role in looking into the matter. The… Read More

February 3, 2021 @ 8:58 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

BNP Paribas Asset Management and the CAIA Association and Hong Kong-based Liquefy have released a research paper covering how tokenization may be used to offer improved access to illiquid alternative investments. The joint paper explains how tokenization may have a lot of potential for use… Read More

February 3, 2021 @ 4:57 pm By JD Alois  |  

Crowdcube and Seedrs are in the midst of a review by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) regarding the proposed merger between the two early-stage funding platforms. The proposed merger was revealed in October of 2020. At that time, Seedrs CEO Jeff Kelinsky stated: “We… Read More