Over the weekend, the price of bitcoin dropped by as much as 20%; the price has since rebounded slightly with a current price as of writing of $1,041; the recent volatility is due to disagreements between developers, exchanges and entrepreneurs about the size limit of a block; some want to increase the current block limit of 1 MB; two groups have been debating including Bitcoin Unlimited, who is advocating for no limit on block sizes, and Bitcoin Core, who is advocating to keep the block size as is; Bitcoin Unlimited has recently threatened to implement a hard fork. Source
American Banker talks with David Klein, CEO of CommonBond about the fintech industry and his insight on the effects of a fintech charter; David Klein says company valuations across the industry are more realistic and the industry is maturing with more lending platform investments focused in later round fundraisings; explains the company's technology solution for employers adding student loan payment benefits; notes the company's default rate is zero; says the OCC fintech charter should give fintech companies better competitive market positioning and help to reduce costs. Source
China's central bank provided its insight on fintech development initiatives for the country in a recent press conference; the press conference included four of the central bank's government officials including Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People's Bank of China; the central bank reported that it encourages and supports fintech development in the country; it spoke about some of its initiatives including a digital currency and other new blockchain solutions; it also noted its work to strengthen regulation specifically in the areas of unlicensed businesses and third-party payment platforms. Source
New York-based ConsenSys has been elected to advise the City of Dubai on the first ever blockchain city technology effort; the initiative is led by the Smart Dubai Office and IBM, the government's strategic partner; as part of the Dubai Blockchain Strategy 2020, the city of Dubai will now require all government records and transactions to be documented using blockchain technology. Source
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was established as part of Dodd-Frank reform following the 2008 financial crisis to focus on financial law pertaining to the protection of consumers in the financial marketplace; in 2016 a three-judge D.C. circuit panel declared the CFPB unconstitutional in the PHH vs. CFPB case and gave full director accountability power to the president; an appeal by the CFPB overturned that ruling and called for a rehearing of the case before a broader panel of judges which is set for May 24, 2017; on Friday, March 17 the US Justice Department filed a brief requesting that the federal appeals court restructure the CFPB; the brief appears to be focused on the fact that the CFPB director was setup to have no accountability to the president; in the case of PHH vs. CFPB, lawyers from PHH reported that the CFPB should be dissolved; the Justice Department's brief appears to focus just on the CFPB director's accountability. Source
Patrick McHenry is one of the most active proponents for fintech in Congress; Lend Academy talks with McHenry at LendIt USA following his keynote presentation; in the podcast he talks about the role of the House Financial Services Committee, his perspective on fintech, current legislation and his outlook for financial innovation over the next four years. Source
Google Play has created a guide for developers focused on fintech financial health apps; the guide was created in partnership with the Center for Financial Services Innovation and specifically its Financial Solutions Lab; the guide provides best practices for developing financial health focused apps for Android and distributing them through Google Play; Google Play is also featuring a page with financial health apps. Source
Technology conglomerate IBM has launched a new set of developer tools for the financial services industry; the IBM Cloud for Financial Services platform will be directed by IBM InterConnect and will provide building blocks for financial services apps built on the IBM Cloud; the platform will target 100,000 individual and enterprise developers with APIs, data and content for financial services apps that can quickly scale to service fintechs, banks, wealth management firms and insurance companies; with the launch, IBM also announced a Singapore Fintech Hub, developed with support from the Singapore central bank, that will plug in to IBM's new Cloud for Financial Services platform and accelerate fintech growth in Singapore and Southeast Asia; across the world, IBM will integrate the new offerings of IBM Cloud for Financial Services at IBM's Business Partner Solution Hubs. Source
The new partnership aims to increase access to financial services for individuals and small businesses; according to a Chinese press release translated by TechNode, the "credit factory" (in Chinese) model is a business model mainly used for credit certification of small and micro-sized enterprises as well as individuals; loans lent to such groups are small, but are lent at high frequency; the adoption of the "credit factory" mode, thanks to its high efficiency and economies of scale in handling petty loans, can help big financial firms gain some ground lost to the country's mushrooming small loan companies in the microfinance market; an upgrade to the traditional "credit factory", Dianrong-Quark Credit Factory utilizes such fintech means as big data, anti-fraud management systems and decision engine; it can help lenders reduce manual operations, save costs and cut operational risks through its powerful quantitative system when they handle credit certification for individuals or small and micro-sized businesses. Source
In the midst of getting ready to launch in a few weeks the UK digital bank Tandem is now unable to launch with savings accounts; the bank was approved in 2015 for a banking license so long as they fulfilled a number of criteria including hiring a board, building out sufficient technology systems and raising enough capital to cover losses; the final point is where the bank was unable to comply, they fell short of raising enough capital and now are forced to launch without the savings feature; Tandem was expecting 29 million British pounds ($36.1 million) from House of Fraser, the UK department store chain that was bought by China's Sanpower Group, but Sanpower was worried about capital restrictions coming out of China so they pulled the funding. Source