N26 is a smartphone only bank that was originally launched in Germany and has big backers like Peter Thiel behind it; Vincent Haupert, a PhD student at the University of Erlangen-Nuernberg, told the Chaos Communications Congress in Hamburg how he and two colleagues found N26 security defenses riddled with holes that could have been used to defraud thousands of users; Haupert presented his findings to the bank and they have since stated that the issues found have been addressed. Source
One of the last actions of the Obama administration this week was to release a policy framework for fintech. This was a follow up from the White House Fintech Summit in June 2016 where many of the leading fintech companies gathered in Washington for a day of presentations and roundtable discussions. The paper provides a framework with ten principles that policymakers and regulators can use to think about and engage with the fintech ecosystem. Given today is the inauguration day for a new administration we won't know if these principles will be carried through but we do hope the Trump White House will make fintech innovation a priority. Source
Tens of thousands of Apple’s US retail employees will be able to test the new credit card powered by Goldman...
The two companies have formed a strategic alliance to help lenders improve collections; Payix will offer integration between its collections tools and the Nortridge Loan System; one advantage of the integration will be increased mobile offerings for borrowers; according to Greg Hindson, Nortridge Software president and CEO, "The integration between Nortridge and Payix makes it easy for borrowers to pay anywhere and anytime – benefiting both borrowers and lenders." Source
The UK has triggered Article 50 and the 27 European Union countries will now begin negotiating with the UK for new terms; Innovate Finance's Lawrence Wintermeyer provides comments on the effects on fintech; says Brexit will make it more challenging for the UK to attract global investment and talent; Wintermeyer also says Brexit could potentially create new opportunities for regtech which will become increasingly important in cross-border activities. Source
As Ethereum stands on the precipice of the merge, we question, what are these "consensus mechanisms" and why does this shift even matter?
This BBC article … The remarkable items that have been used as currency … got me thinking about tokenisation. The article discusses the use of shells, specifically the seasnail shell called a cowrie, and how it became a global currency by around 1200BC. Although the cowrie is mainly found in …
Global SME lending fintech Tradeplus24 is launching into the UK with the close of a £30 million debt facility provided...
The website for the new platform is chain.baidu.com; it is a project from the firm’s research on blockchain; they see early applications of the platform in asset securitization and asset exchanges; registration on the website is open to the public and users can deploy custom blockchain nodes. Source
With Coinbase Prime and Aladdin integration, Coinbase and BlackRock will create new access points for institutional crypto adoption.