Do you know anyone who gets paid in Bitcoin, or buys train tickets from an automated kiosk using cryptocurrencies? If you do, the person getting paid is probably based in Japan (where Partial salary payment in Bitcoin has been an option for years). And digital-currency train ticket purchase has been a feature on Swiss train […]
We are well past the new-kid-on-the-block era for alternative funding of UK businesses. Peer-to-peer (P2P) finance has evolved into a sector where most of the successful players look for profitable niche lending (in Money&Co.’s case – property-backing, music rights and litigation finance). But the broad-brush picture still sees a need for alternative funding. Witness the […]
Regular visitors to this News site will know that we regard the issue of digital currency as resolved. It is not just the future, but the present. It’s been possible to effect crypto transactions by ATM. The Japanese can pay themselves in cryptos, and the Swiss can buy train tickets from machines on the station […]
Ahead of our much-heralded (on this News site, at least) suite of new loan offerings, we bring news of the latest bit of integration between the mainstream and the world of crypto. Our friends at Finextra report: Crypto exchange and mobile banking platform hi has teamed up with BaaS player Contis on a debit card […]
Irresistible forces and immovable objects have a fair bit of history. Inevitably, the irresistible force ends up the winner. In FinTech, cryptos are the coming thing. And nothing, it seems, can stop them. The UK’s top financial watchdog, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), is reduced to little more than whining in this report from our […]
Regular visitors to our News section will be aware of one of the major developments in digital currencies – the attempt by central banks to muscle in on the scene. Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) are digital, but not crypto currencies. The differentiating factor is that the central banks keep a register of the holders […]
Last week we wrote up news of the advent of Britcoin, the UK’s own central bank digital currency (CBDC). Today our friends at Finextra bring word of the latest CBDC developments in the European Union. The European Central Bank has hired ING’s global director of payments, Evelien Witlox, to head up its digital euro programme. […]
The convergence between the “alternative” finance and the mainstream continues apace. This snippet of product news, brought to us by our friends at Finextra, is indicative of the general theme. Starling Bank has released a new feature that enables customers to make specific recurring bill payments from an alloted ‘Saving Space’, separate from their main […]
The FinTech sector is undoubtedly booming. With buoyant funding levels, new product launches and acquisitions aplenty, our friends at Finextra report the latest. With VC investment in the UK’s financial technology sector soaring, Tech Nation has unveiled the 30 scaleups selected to participate in the fourth cohort of its fintech programme. The six-month government-backed programme […]
The future is almost with us. Our friends at Finextra run a report on the biggest study of mobile wallets – the digital devices that store cryptocurrencies – in the world. Released by payments fintech Boku, with data from Juniper Research, the research reveals that Europe will be home to four of the ten fastest-growing countries for […]