Sheltered Harbor began earlier this year and covers around 400 million accounts across banks and credit unions; members of the project are required to back up data so other banks can serve customers in the event that another bank becomes disabled; the project goes beyond concerns over customer data being stolen to address concerns that a cyberattack could destroy or lock data. Source
Acting CFPB Head Mick Mulvaney said he thought the payday lending rule was too far along for the agency to change but that he supports a congressional rollback; the Congressional Review Act gives Congress 60 days to nullify a regulation; Mr. Mulvaney is currently involved in a dispute over whether or not he can run the agency on an interim basis and he said he anticipates staying for 5 to 7 months. Source.
The new unit at the SEC was started in September to focus on potential illegal activities in the digital currency market; the ICO that was shut down promised returns of 1,000 percent; the SEC filed charges against Dominic Lacroix who they claim was trying to raise $15mn from thousands of investors. Source.
Banks of all sizes and core provider FIS have begun testing Amazon’s Alexa service to complete voice commands in banking; instead of customers logging into their banking app they would simply ask Alexa for a balance or to transfer funds; skills, as they are referred to, are constantly being refined as confusion over pronunciation still occur with the technology only being widely used in recent years; it is still early days for this type of technology to be used in a sophisticated way but the industry is showing that they are willing to test innovative ideas. Source.
The CBOE will launch bitcoin futures on Sunday December 10th and said that trading will be free for the first month; “We are committed to encouraging fairness and liquidity in the bitcoin market. To promote this, we will initially offer XBT futures trading for free,” commented Ed Tilly, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of CBOE; CBOE’s bitcoin futures will trade on CFE un the ticker XBT. Source.
Last week LendingClub closed a whole loan transaction structured as a tradable, pass-through security called a CLUB Certificate; Lend Academy reached out to LendingClub to find out more and shares what benefits this structure has for some investors. Source
Prosper CEO David Kimball spoke at a conference last week stating, “Our main concern… it’s always liquidity, and I think most people in this room understand that the best way to get to liquidity is to have a lot of different options. And so I think you’ll see our toolkit expand [in 2018] versus where it is now.” Kimball also spoke about the challenges the company has had to overcome and the recent successes for the company including Prosper’s three securitizations and becoming cash flow positive. Source
Barclaycard is rebranding as Barclays in the US and launching a digital only bank in 2018; they have been testing the market since last year and plan to fully launch their offering next year; Barclays is more of a household name in the UK but has been offering credit card services under the Barclaycard name in the US. Source.
Cross River Bank is looking at new opportunities in business payments; Ben Isaacson of Cross River Bank stated, “Payroll is predominantly set up for traditional salary, ‘regular’ employees. There’s a real opportunity to innovate on that front; businesses can change how their employees get paid to be more consistent with how they’re working.”; they are also looking at how they can better improve payments to suppliers for their customers; Cross River Bank currently works with some of the biggest names in fintech and prides itself as being a technology-first bank. Source
This weeks PeerIQ Weekly Industry Update covers the power struggle at the CFPB and Lending Club’s new pass through security transaction; a federal judge sided with the Trump administration in the CFPB spat and allowed for Mr. Mulvaney to run the agency for now; Lending Club completed a first of it’s kind deal and in turn will help them to expand the market, lower financing costs, address secondary market liquidity and allows valuation agents to calibrate pricing; PeerIQ also took a deep dive on mortgage delinquencies during the 2008 financial crisis. Source.