Breaking Banks

In This Episode

This special episode of Breaking Banks begins with a mashup interview with the new Lord Mayor of London, Nicholas Lyons, Brett King and Emerge Everywhere host Jennifer Tescher. The Lord Mayor of London is the mayor of the City of London and the leader of the City of London Corporation, a municipal governing body covering the historic center of London and the location of much of the United Kingdom's financial sector. As ambassador for the UK's Financial & Professional Services, and accorded precedence over all individuals except the sovereign, he retains traditional powers, rights and privileges, and some ceremonial duties. Look for the Lord Mayor of London at the coronation of King Charles III.

As a top global financial center, The Lord Mayor of London wants to help companies grow, scale, and stay in London and the UK.  With London's fintech success, he's focusing on tech innovation across the board -- green tech, biotech, life sciences, renewable tech -- encouraging start-ups and looking to create more investment from the UK system as well as access to funding. He's thinking 30 years ahead, framing options for the growth economy, and looking at the painful divide in society and widening gap in numeracy, financial literacy and financial inclusion --  initiatives he's working hard to address in his mayoralty. Part of the answer lies in fintech, with London all about building bridges and partnerships.

Then Brett continues the investment theme with a conversation with Alex Sion, Managing Director, Motive Partners, mentor of hundreds of start-ups and lecturer on innovation, fintech and digital strategy having co-founded a neobank himself and having led innovation efforts at Citi and JP Morgan Chase. They discuss current challenges for banking and what has happened in the startup world particularly in fintech where Silicon Valley Bank was a big supporter and validator, and what the next chapter looks like. It’s all things fintech from a VC perspective.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGptCgG_dWs

In This Episode

How many closed loop city transit cards do you have lying around? If you are a traveller you have lots of these souvenirs as every city has its own transit card or way of doing things, Can open payments and better payment systems improve public transportation and bring the unbanked into the financial ecosystem? Aaron Klein, Senior Fellow, Policy Director, Center for Regulation and Markets, Brookings Institute, not to mention former US Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, and US Dept of the Treasury, and Gillian Gillett, Program Manager, California Integrated Mobility, California Dept of Transportation (CADOT) think so. Listen as they share latest research and interesting insights, to include California's adoption of new payment rails for urban transport, with host Brett King. The faster the payment, the faster we move, with implications for EVs and business. Digital inclusion remains important as is reforming how we charge for micropayments.

Our connect theme continues as we look at Fintech as a Service (FaaS) and Brett catches up with NayaOne, CEO, Karan Jain, former Westpac exec. NayaOne is helping transform how banks bring new products to market. They need only 'Connect Once' as the platform enables FI's, fintechs, regulators, and industry bodies to collaborate with a pre-vetted fintech marketplace. A 2020 PwC global study showed that 75% of banks are investing in developing a more customer-focused business model by collaborating with fintechs. Banks want these partnerships, but not everyone realizes innovation the same way. Banks need to be fintech friendly and ready. Culture is important and action needs to match words if banks want to be at the leading edge and make an impact for their customers.

https://youtu.be/Ens-lMdv0AQ

In This Episode

Today's episode checks in on the embedded finance story, how software platforms are embedding payments and financial services into their software offerings. Listen as Brett King speaks with Becky Kopplin, Payment Strategist and Product Leader at Qualis Partners and Matt Downs, Group President, Worldpay for Platforms, FIS about what software-led, embedded payments are and how they compare with other integrated payment models. The trio cover the difference between embedded finance and embedded payments and how they affect banks, how cloud business management platforms make deeper payment workflows so attractive and where trends will take us next. The ability to offer embedded payments in context and at the moment when you need it, making it as easy as possible are key elements of success (and experience), and will help banks become increasingly more relevant in this digital age. 

Brett closes by interviewing New York Times best-selling author Diana Kander about her latest book, Go Big or Go Home. In today's hyper competitive and rapidly changing world, to succeed Kander and co-author Tucker Trotter suggest creating memorable experiences to help you land business and to ensure you are not instantly forgettable and regretfully mediocre. Whether a start up, established brand, or something in between, thoughts will be provoked.

For more information, visit FISglobal.com/WorldpayPlatforms

https://youtu.be/mCt9_hHH71o

https://youtu.be/fPKlZzjEln0

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Artificial intelligence offers both risks and rewards for business leaders. On the one hand, AI has the potential to improve business operations, increase efficiency, reduce costs, and drive innovation. AI can be used to automate repetitive tasks, analyze vast amounts of data, and provide valuable insights that can inform strategic decision-making.

However, there are also risks associated with AI, such as the potential for biased or inaccurate decision-making, the possibility of job displacement, and concerns around data privacy and security. Leaders must carefully consider these risks and rewards when implementing AI in their organizations and ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to mitigate potential negative impacts.

Is there more to it than that? After all, that introduction was actually written by the AI-powered chatbot called ChatGPT, so maybe it had some built-in bias.

To dig deeper host JP Nicols speaks with a human, Al Cowger, who is an attorney and author of the book One Nation Under Algorithms: The Threats of Algorithms and AI to Civil Rights, Legal Remedies, and American Jurisprudence.

Al has a new article coming out in a technology journal at Case Western Reserve University entitled Corporate Fiduciary Duty in the Age of Algorithms, where he looks at the growing use of algorithms and artificial intelligence and the potential threats and new liabilities they may create for business managers and board members.

In our second half, the promise of conversational AI has so far been a disappointing series of chatbots helping banks reduce cost but doing little to inspire customers or improve the service experience. Can ChatGPT help the sector do better? Breaking Banks Asia Pacific hosts Rachel Williamson and Simon Spencer, resident AI expert, tackle the subject, ask ChatGPT, and offer a use case of a Singapore-based insurtech firm that is using big data and AI to help deliver their products.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFoeHC1uD40

In This Episode

No matter your sector, innovation is transforming the financial world. The impact is hitting fast and hard. At times, innovation may seem like a nice to have, especially in an uncertain market environment, but it’s clear that innovation is having a significant impact on businesses around the world.

In today's episode of Breaking Banks, host Brett King speaks with Melissa Cullen, Global Head of Strategy, Product and Commercialization at FIS Banking Solutions; and Tony Warren, Global Head of Strategy and Solutions Management at FIS Capital Markets Solutions about findings from FIS' 2023 Global Innovation Report.  Listen as they discuss what the world's leading financial institutions and companies think about Embedded Finance, ESG and DeFi, as well as implications of Generative AI.

Innovations are appearing faster than ever. With so much disruption -- and opportunity -- the industry must be all the more agile to turn the change to their advantage.

Shownotes: The full report can be accessed here: www.fisglobal.com/global-innovation-report

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEwKBgI3R94

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It's another spicy episode of Breaking Banks featuring Jason Henrichs and custom hot sauce fans Kiah Haslett, Managing Editor, Bank Director and Alex Johnson, Creator, Fintech Takes. The three are back at it and always game for taste testing and discussing hot issues in financial services. Along with the sauce, we offer an entire episode onDeposits.  Are they hot or not!? Every bank wants and needs deposits, there are several types of deposits, some riskier than others. Banks need to update deposit strategies and determine their value proposition. With tech making it easy to move deposits, and every bank competing for them, lack of strategy can be dangerous. Deposit strategy and betas are coming up in discussion around SVB andSilvergate...deposit strategy, it’s something every institution needs to think about.

Enjoy the deep dive!

https://youtu.be/UdSvwdzgNYM

In This Episode

Today's special episode of Breaking Banks comes to you live from Fintech House @SXSW. Listen as guest host Dara Tarkowski, Managing Partner, Actuate Law and host of Breaking Banks' sister podcast Tech on Reg speaks with Mike Bechtel, Chief Futurist at Deloitte Consulting and David Reiling, Chairman and CEO, Sunrise Banks; Author, Fintech for Good; and host of Provoke.fm's NextGen Banker. These are wild times, it helps to have a futurist with a background in anthropology to put things in perspective. Where are the opportunities in evolving technology, what's hype and nonsense? At times we are so busy wondering if we can do something, that we don't always think if we should. Intentionality and mindfulness are good things, and mild chaos is where opportunity lies, where niches and new angles can be discovered.

In 2013 there were 2.7 billion unbanked people in the world. Today the number stands at 1.3 billion. Huge strides have been made in the last decade vs. the last hundred years. Listen as Brett King connects with Kosta Peric, Deputy Director, Financial Services for the Poor, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in the second half of the show. It's important for everyone to be part of the economy -- an economy that includes everyone benefits everyone. Listen as they discuss global advances in banking and payments, digital public infrastructure, and the importance of mobile wallets and identity. Game changing innovation at work!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBUr4DJKdRs

The banking industry is entering a perilous new phase, and new developments are happening quickly so we’re dropping this episode early. The second largest bank failure in history came suddenly with Silicon Valley Bank being shut down by regulators on March 10. This comes just two days after Silvergate bank announced it was closing “voluntarily”.

Joining our resident recovering banker and host JP Nicols are Kiah Haslett, managing editor at Bank Director, and John Maxfield principal at Maxfield on Banks, who has written extensively on the history of banking and bank failures. They examine where this all fits in the history of bank closures, why it happened, and where the risks and opportunities are from here. John argues that while scarcity is the primary constraint in most industries, for banking it’s abundance. Was a decade and a half of low to zero interest rates too much of a good thing? What’s the role of Fed interest rate hikes?

JP and John debate if banks being too boring is riskier than being too “innovative”, Kiah muses about the role of faster money movement, and she’s ready for more hot wings after all of these hot takes, but we’ll save that for a show that Jason hosts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whKMyNynkBI

Financial health is a composite of an individual's financial life, whether they are spending, saving, borrowing and planning in ways that enable them to be resilient and pursue opportunities.

In today's episode we look at finhealth from a different angle. Listen as Jason Henrichs speaks with two leaders bringing financial health, financial services and healthcare, to the next level. MA-based, non-profit, About Fresh and its Co-Founder and CEO, Josh Trautwein and Jennifer Tescher, President and CEO, Financial Health Network and host of Provoke.fm's Emerge Everywhere. Cool things are happening at the intersection of fintech, healthcare and food accessibility all with the goal to provide better health outcomes for everyone. Today we spotlight About Fresh's Fresh Connect, a platform that enables healthcare providers to connect patients to the food they need to be healthy. With the help of a debit card, doctors prescribe free fruits and vegetables. Once enrolled in the program, the debit card enables the patient to purchase produce and healthy items at stores, farmers markets, mobile marts and online where they already shop. HIPAA compliant, the system recognizes eligible healthy foods at checkout, covering the cost. This tech enabled food prescription program is helping to transform patient care, improve health outcomes -- healthcare teams can measure impact via frictionless payment technology --and provide access to healthy foods, overcoming challenges of food deserts and even branch deserts.  Good things are happening in FinHealth! 

https://youtu.be/CV9poQ5iS4o

This week on Breaking Banks we feature sister podcast Breaking Banks Europe as they take a sneak peek at Finovate Europe, March 14th and 15th in London. As with other Finovate conferences, get your votes ready! There will be demos aplenty, listen to learn about this year’s enhancements, stellar all-star panels, conference sustainability efforts and different networking opportunities, startup booster and… “HOT OR NOT?”

Curious? Breaking Banks Europe host Francesca Aliverti connects with Greg Palmer, VP and Master of Ceremonies, Finovate conferences, not to mention provoke.fm’s Finovate podcast host, and Theodora Lau, Unconventional Ventures, who started her speaking career several years back on the stage at Finovate. Make plans to attend in London....if we don't see you there, make sure to listen here!

https://youtu.be/-Zp2-qmw4Mg