IBS Intelligence Global FinTech Interviews

 The Shareholder Rights Directive 2 (SRD2) is a European Union (EU) directive, which, among other things, sets out to strengthen the position of shareholders. It also aims to improve communication by share issuers. Does this matter if you are not in the EU or even the EEA? Yes! The directive explicitly outlines its applicability to non-EU/EEA intermediaries. SRD2 will be implemented as of Septembe...

In the first instalment of IBS Intelligence’s International Women’s Day series, Sunniva Kolostyak sits down with Anne Boden of Starling Bank to discuss women in power, entrepreneurship and the continued development of one of the UK’s most prominent challenger banks. 

Over the last few years, the torchbearers of the innovations have been the new age FinTechs and this is somehow forcing bigger payments and financial services companies to play catch-up. Ajay Adisheshann, Founder of Indian B2B payments company PayMate talks to Priyanka Pani of IBS Intelligence on the strategies adopted by global card networks such as Mastercard and Visa to remain relevant in a ver...

 eToro is a global multi-asset investment platform with some 12 million users worldwide. It was one of the first platforms to offer 0% commission on stock trades. The eToro platform claims to be the only venue where investors may hold traditional assets such as stocks or commodities alongside ‘new’ assets such as Bitcoin. The firm has also pioneered social trading – allowing investors to follow ot...

Cube is a global wealth management services company that helps people, across 50 countries, invest in emerging markets including India and other developed markets.  In this Podcast, Cube’s Founder Satyen Kothari talks about how technology can help the millennials and aspirational salaried class to be able to invest smartly to grow their personal wealth instead of depending on bank savings, fixed d...

 Yobota is a London based FinTech. It has developed a cloud-based core operating platform for financial services. In 2018, Yobota enabled Chetwood Financial to launch its LiveLend and SmartSave Bank brands. Chetwood was the only bank fully authorised by the UK’s Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) in 2018. Yobota co-founder James King spoke to Robin Amlôt about the company’s platform and the adv...

 Digital identities benefits both companies and customers across onboarding and KYC processes, but are potential pitfalls, such as data safety, risks that are too substantial for financial services? Hardik Shah, Group Head of Product at Currencies Direct, discusses the concept, as well as what a universal solution could mean for the industry, with Sunniva Kolostyak. 

In this episode, Sunniva Kolostyak speaks to Jason Harrell from the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) about operational resilience and the risks associated, industry and regulatory responses such as public-private partnerships, and the idea of a third-party resilience framework. 

 Founded in 2010, Netherlands-based five°degrees offers a next-generation, digital core banking software platform. The company’s Matrix product offers a fully automated banking services solution that supports any segment, product, or channel via a mid-office environment, connected either to legacy back-office, or to the Matrix back office. Robin Amlôt sat down with Thomas Muth of five°degrees to d...

 How do financial technology companies adapt to accommodate for changing consumer behaviour and rising online commerce? In this episode, Peter O’Halloran from Fiserv discusses the rise of digital commerce with Sunniva Kolostyak, and how it forces merchants and regulation to change with it. 

 iFAST Financial India is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Singapore-based iFAST Corporation Ltd, which is in the race to bag a digital banking licence in Singapore. iFAST is competing with Alipay and 20 other big players for the licence. Hon, speaks with IBS Intelligence, on the rationale behind the company’s plan to go for a digital banking licence and his views on the future of banking. Hon is opti...

 Rehan Yar Khan, Partner and Founder of Indian VC fund Orios Venture Partners. The VC, which started with its investments in consumer-facing Internet start-ups such as ride-sharing Unicorn Ola Cabs, the focus is now to invest in the booming Indian FinTech ecosystem. The VC now plans to invest a third of its fund in FinTech start-ups in 2020. Rehan, however, doesn’t follow the herd. He talks to IBS...

Time is money! In December 2019 it was revealed by The Times newspaper that access to a back-up communications system had resulted in those paying for a Bank of England audio feed, via a third party, receiving details of the Bank’s news conferences up to eight seconds before those using the video feed. The UK central bank referred the matter to the Financial Conduct Authority and investigations ar...

 Fino Payments Bank is a new kind of bank in India called Payments Bank, a license given out by the Indian banking regulator RBI in 2014 to eleven players. While the model was created to drive financial inclusion with the help of technology, these banks have been facing challenges as they are not allowed to lend.  Mumbai-based Fino is one among the four such banks that have not only survived but a...

 Cashless is coming, so it is said. For some it is already here. Jeremy Nicholds, CEO of mobile payments provider Judopay told Robin Amlôt he is close to celebrating a year ‘cash free’. Nicholds, who has worked for both MasterCard and Visa in his career, has a passion for payment technology. Judopay, using smart native technology, provides payments solutions to clients such as KFC, Young’s, JustPa...

 Lausanne, Switzerland-based SwissBorg is a FinTech company on the Etherium blockchain. The company’s stated aim is to revolutionise asset management solutions with a community-centric approach. It carried out a successful ICO in 2017/18, raising $50 million from 24,000 individual contributors around the world. Alex Fazel, talked to Robin Amlôt about the outlook for developments in cryptocurrencie...

 Crowdfunder.co.uk was founded in 2014 and claims to be UK’s number one rewards-based crowdfunding platform. The funding portal has helped raise more than £100 million for charities, businesses, and community projects. Crowdfunder.co.uk also works with several corporates to distribute grants, including Santander and RBS NatWest. Duncan Parker of crowdfunder.co.uk talked to Robin Amlôt about the si...

 Lory Kehoe is also Co-founder of Blockchain Ireland and Adjunct Associate Professor Trinity College Dublin. The ConsenSys Codefi blockchain operating system, built on the Ethereum blockchain aims to optimise business processes and payments through digitising financial instruments and creating decentralised applications. Speaking to Robin Amlôt at London’s FinTech Connect conference, Lory Kehoe of...

 “Banks are dead, long live the banks,” Suresh Vaghjiani of Tribe Payments once said. The card payments platform’s CEO and Co-Founder met up with Sunniva Kolostyak at FinTech Connect in London to discuss how start-ups and challenger banks have different innovation techniques and why legacy institutions are struggling to keep up, as well as how regulation made London the FinTech capital of the worl...

  To simply implement this new regime, using current toolsets, poses a risk to firms falling short to the requirements of the SM&CR regime, Saeed Patel of KRM22 says. In this podcast, Patel discusses the Senior Managers and Certification Regime (SM&CR or SMCR) with IBS Intelligence Reporter Sunniva Kolostyak. The UK regime, which is being extended to almost 50,000 organisations, will come...

 iBanFirst is a Belgium-based global financial services firm offering cross-border payment solutions. Founder Pierre-Antoine Dusoulier was previously Head of Western Europe at Saxo Bank following eight years as President and CEO of Saxo Banque France. Prior to this he founded cambiste.com, France’s first licensed forex broker, and worked as a forex trader at Calyon UK. Robin Amlôt spoke to Pierre-...

 Cashless payments are sweeping the scene, enabling consumers to shop more easily, quickly, and conveniently – in fact, by 2026 it’s predicted that cash will be used for just 21% of all UK payments. However, business in the ‘unattended market’ poses a challenge. Robin Amlôt talks to Lee Jones of Ingenico about the move to cashless payments and what it means for hardware as well as software. 

 With the death of the high street, banks are closing their branches and becoming increasingly digital. At the RBR Branch Transformation conference in London, Sunniva Kolostyak spoke to Mark Aldred from Auriga about how the software company supports banks in changing how their branch estates operate. Different technologies, such as AI and machine learning could drive optimisation, but the banks mu...

 IBS Intelligence hosted the awards ceremony for the 1st Global FinTech Innovation Awards at the Four Seasons Hotel Mumbai, on 22 November 2019. The Awards were created to honour and promote excellence and success in the implementation of FinTech solutions. Ahead of the presentations, Robin Amlôt sat with V Ramkumar, Senior Partner, Cedar Management Consulting International, chair of the Awards Pa...

 SunTec Business Solutions aims to help banks and digital and communication service providers increase customer engagement and product innovation. Robin Amlôt spoke to Madhur Jain of Suntec about the growth prospects for Banking as a Service (BaaS). With consumers becoming used to being able to buy everything online, financial products will be no different.