Chain CEO Adam Ludwin sat with Business Insider to talk about blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies; the interview goes through the basics of what blockchain technology is and how it has been viewed by the wider market in recent years; the hype around the technology has made many believe it can transform anything and everything; in reality, Adam says, it is a tool that should be applied where relevant; they also explore the differences in selling into an institution and how the technology is used in bitcoin transactions. Source.
News Roundup
This page contains an archive of the Global Newsletter summaries and the weekly fintech news roundups.
Every day the Fintech Nexus news team scours the globe for the most important stories of the day to include in our daily newsletter.
Then every Saturday we bring you our weekly news roundup of the top 10 fintech stories of the week with commentary from Peter Renton.
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Overstock.com has launched a robo advising investor platform that will be presented by tZERO Advisors; investors can choose from a group of portfolios or create their own for $9.95 a month; tZERO Advisors uses FusionIQ’s investment platform which allows for the online investing; “This service introduces robo-advising investment management services to our millions of customers and continues Overstock’s commitment to bridging Wall Street and e-commerce,” shared Overstock founder and CEO Patrick Byrne to Crowdfund Insider. Source.
Ireland has become a hub of technological innovation as big tech, fintech and big financial services companies set up shop in country as an alternative to the UK; “Ireland has always been quite an innovative country; it has to be because it is such a small market, you can’t just lean on the Irish market to produce a decent fintech business.” says Sinead Fitzmaurice, co-founder of TransferMate, to the FT; talent from Google and Facebook have not only started their own companies but have also moved into finance giants like Deutsche Bank; low corporate tax rates combined with the tech talent has help the country become an emerging fintech market. Source.
Yahoo Finance's new app called Tanda has a unique approach to helping consumers save money; users pool their money over time with others; those who decide to withdraw money from the pool first pay a small fee while the last person in the group receives a small bonus; Lend Academy shares more details and screenshots of the the app. Source
- Bradley Strock, PayPal CIO, Joins Elevate’s Board of Directors
- Redpoint Capital Group Rebrands as Park Cities Asset Management
- Zopa surpasses £3bn in lending
- Juniper Square Raises $8M in Series A Funding
- LendingPoint Names Antonio Martino as new CFO
- Juniper Square raises $6M for its real estate investment platform
- Bitbond Launches Alternative Investment Fund in Partnership with 1741 Fund Management
- Bitfury Enters Bitcoin Crime-Fighting Business
SoFi recently partnered with WeWork to offer discounted student refinancing to WeWork employees and members; the move is part of a broader strategy for the company to move beyond their initial target market of alumni from top universities; offering student loan repayments as a workplace benefit is a new trend as companies look to help young employees get out from under the mountain of student debt; “The bigger story is that the student loan pay down as a benefit is a massive industry that hasn’t even got going yet — every Fortune 500 company is going to have this as a benefit in the next year or two,” said Peter Renton, analyst and founder of Lend Academy, to TearSheet. Source.
Chinese lenders are moving into Southeast Asian countries to explore new opportunities in lightly regulated countries; according to Global Times, over 50 Chinese lenders have already launched overseas operations in countries like Indonesia and Cambodia; current entrants include well known names like CreditEase, Lufax and jimu.com; some lenders are opening up subsidiaries while others are focusing on partnerships with local companies. Source
SBI Group, owner of SoftBank is investing into the mobile-first bank; SBI Group will also get a seat on Moven's board and the companies plan to form a joint venture in Japan; Moven is also splitting its business in two; one side is the software provider that powers digital banking software and the other is the neobank, MovenBank; Moven also announced that it is in the process of purchasing a US bank. Source
Goldman Sachs has been busy acquiring companies to boost its consumer facing business; they now have expertise across consumer lending, small business lending and real estate; Lend Academy shares their latest acquisitions, including the acquisition of Final, a credit card startup; it seems as though credit cards was the missing piece and it's possible Goldman Sachs will enter the credit card business. Source
Augmentum Capital, venture group backed by Lord Rothschild, is looking to raise more than $175mn for a closed end fund to invest in fintech startups; the company plans to take positions in p2p lending platform Zopa and crowdfunding platform Seedrs, both of whom are in the UK; “There are very few places you can go to right now to invest in fintech at the moment on the public markets,” said George O’Connor, analyst at Stifel, to the FT. “So [this] taps into the zeitgeist.” Source.