Speaking at the International Fintech Conference hosted by the UK government, Bank of England Governor Mark Carney explained how the Bank of England is looking at the new rise of fintech firms; "Light touch regulation, out-moded codes of market conduct, inadequate settlement and clearing infrastructure all contributed, we can draw on these experiences to help ensure that fintech boosts growth and promotes financial stability," explained Carney; he also pointed out that regulators cannot hamstring innovation as the benefits from fintech should not be stamped out by regulation. Source
CB Insights reports on first quarter 2017 venture capital deals in their "MoneyTree Report" published in collaboration with PwC; globally, venture capitalists invested $27.1 billion in the first quarter with 2,228 deals; deals and investments increased from the fourth quarter of 2016 and were below the first quarter of 2016. Source
City A.M. reports on Sydney-based Othera's use of blockchain for improving liquidity in online lending; Othera is a P2P lender; once its loans are made, it has developed a process through blockchain operations that can assign loan portions to tokens that can then be tracked through blockchain operations and sold on an exchange; the firm already uses blockchain for all of its lending operations and has a global patent pending for the tokens. Source
Chinese startup Niu Jiao Suo is connecting Chinese investors with foreign mutual funds; investors can currently access funds offered by Blackrock, Vanguard, JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs; investors are limited by $50,000 per year but can start with as little as $400; interestingly Niu Jiao Suo is not managing its users money and focuses on ensuring users don't exceed the $50,000 limit; according to Crowdfund Insider: "After funds are deposited into a user's account, the money is sent directly to a custodial account managed by DBS Bank. Niu Jiao Suo's primary role is conducting due diligence on the users to make sure they have a clean background and are not US citizens." Source
Hywin Financial Holding Group has announced the acquisition of UK wealth manager Azure Wealth; Azure Wealth will change its name to Hywin Wealth and operate as a subsidiary of the financial holding company; according to Managing Partner Massimo Scalabrini, "All other management and operational responsibilities as well as our principles, ethos and investment management philosophy remain unchanged."; the acquisition will provide the UK-based firm with wealth management expansion opportunities in Asia; Hywin Financial Holding Group has over 20 wholly-owned and holding subsidiaries with over 100 billion Chinese yuan ($14.53 billion) in assets under management. Source
Singapore hosted the 3rd Singapore-Shanghai Financial Forum this week helping to strengthen relationships in the region; over 200 participants were in attendance; the theme of the event was "Strengthening Singapore-Shanghai Collaboration in a Changing Financial World Order" and discussions were centered around deepening financial connections between Singapore and Shanghai; Jacqueline Loh, deputy managing director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, was a featured keynote speaker at the event and spoke about the opportunities for fintech collaboration in the region. Source
Barclays recently announced Shelton Shugar as the new CIO of the credit card division; in a Q&A with American Banker, Shugar discusses how they plan to compete in the US payment space and ultimately compete with fintechs; he also talks about the company's cloud computing strategy as well as his perspective on voice recognition and chatbots. Source
Implementation of blockchain operations for the finance industry is still ten years away according to UBS executive, Veronica Lange; speaking at the Innovate Finance Global Summit in London, the UBS head of innovation says blockchain is still primarily in a research and development phase; there are a lot of positive reports about pilot programs and solutions and the finance industry is moving toward greater utilization of the technology but discussions at the Innovate Finance Global Summit report that new infrastructure will be required for full deployment and that will take time. Source
The UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) released a discussion paper on blockchain that looked to better understand the new technology and how it can be used in financial services; key takeaways from the paper include the ability to cut costs and remove certain back office operations to streamline processes and increase the speed of reconciliation; while there are many potential benefits, the FCA still wants to ensure the risks don't outweigh the benefits; the FCA is also looking at how they might regulate blockchain, they typically regulate the application of technology but to ensure what they are calling "sensible development" they might consider regulating the actual ledger technology. Source
Bitcoin trading has become a viable income source for many Chinese cryptocurrency traders; launched in 2009 the cryptocurrency has recently reached highs of over 8,000 yuan ($1,160.65) and is currently trading at around 6,600 yuan ($957.53); with a global worth of over $14 billion, over 90% is currently in yuan and Chinese investors are actively taking advantage of the currency's gains; investor Huai Yang is reportedly earning 1 million yuan ($145,081) per month from trading bitcoin; other investors have also reported steady bitcoin trading monthly incomes of over 40,000 yuan ($5,803). Source