DigFin VOX

Johnson Chen is founder and CEO of Singapore fintech CapBridge Financial and its blockchain-infrastructure subsidiary 1X. CapBridge is enabling corporate bonds, unicorn-company equities, real estate and private-equity funds to be accessed and traded by family offices. Johnson speaks with Jame DiBiasio about building CapBridge's investor base and improving markets through next-gen technology.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Johnson Chen, CapBridge Financial

1:30 - CapBridge's two business lines

2:29 - Providing access to unicorn company equity

3:20 - Fractionalizing private equity funds

4:08 - Asian demand for private equity

5:07 - Real estate

7:15 - Facilitating allocations to alternative investments

8:40 - 1X and DLT (distributed ledger technology)

11:25 - Piloting 1X for equities

12:20 - The problems that DLT/blockchain can solve

13:48 - Creating secondary-market liquidity

15:18 - The challenge of adoption

17:14 - Building CapBridge's investor base

19:22 - Backing by AMTD

21:37 - The ceremonial blade

Brad Jones is CEO of Wave Money, a digital payments fintech in Myanmar. In the past year the business has had to weather a military coup, telco outages, deadly Covid, and shareholder changes. Brad speaks with Jame DiBiasio about managing multiple crises and returning to a path of growth.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Brad Jones, Wave Money

1:29 - Multiple shocks to the business

2:50 - Crisis decision making

6:06 - Keys to survival

7:33 - Staying committed

8:43 - Returning to business as usual

9:54 - Ant Group transaction hit

12:36 - Shareholder Telenor exits

14:14 - Ambitions for the tech stack

16:35 - Building in resilience, InfoSec

18:22 - Digitizing Myanmar

19:42 - Marketing and branding

Val Yap is founder and CEO of Singapore-based insurtech PolicyPal, a unit of AMTD Group. She tells Jame DiBiasio about her company's recent acquisition, growth plans, the state of insurtech today, and feedback from writing her memoir.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Val Yap, PolicyPal

1:28 - PolicyPal's mission and evolution

3:46 - Acquiring Value Champion

5:08 - Entering new verticals

5:24 - Creating new insurtech products

7:14 - Platform competition

10:55 - Winning customer attention and trust

13:42 - Competing versus partnering with insurance cos.

15:29 - State of insurtech v Big Tech, incumbents

20:11 - Expanding PolicyPal into new geographies

23:09 - Val's memoir "Balls Inc." as a female founder

Gaming, crypto, NFTs, the metaverse...what's it all about, and should this matter to the finance industry? Gil Bashan, chief product officer at U.S. tech company StrongNode, discusses the nexus between gaming and fintech with DigFin's Jame DiBiasio.

Regtech – regulation technology – is now critical for financial institutions, but needs vary by market. Ashish Rai of FIS discusses the big-picture challenges in capital markets.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Ashish Rai, FIS

1:13 - Trends in capital-markets regulation

2:56 - Differences between Hong Kong and Singapore

5:37 - Are back offices ready for compliance tech needs?

7:10 - Regtech's strengths in capital markets

8:25 - And its shortfalls; has A.I. delivered?

10:33 - Banks and asset managers' benefits in future

11:45 - Risk management in machine learning and regtech

15:28 - Most important upcoming regulations

17:10 - What about Asia's developing markets

18:22 - Is it getting easier to scale financial businesses in Asia?

19:17 - Goals for FIS in Asia in 2022

20:59 - Your regulatory wishlist for next year

WeLab operates a virtual bank in Hong Kong as well as banking, payments, and tech businesses in mainland China and Indonesia – with an IPO on the cards. Founder Simon Loong speaks with Jame DiBiasio about metrics for a virtual bank, doing business in the Greater Bay Area, and what's next.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Simon Loong, WeLab

1:36 - Metrics for virtual banks

2:57 - Comparing with incumbent banks

5:27 - Fintech and virtual-bank lending practices

6:52 - Is tech really a differentiator?

8:54 - Incumbents also catching up in digital

11:06 - WeLab's other businesses and markets

15:17 - Strategic investor AllianzX

17:14 - Wealth business in Greater Bay Area

20:56 - Tech's role in GBA wealth and banking

23:27 - VCs and strategic investors

26:19 - IPO, profitability, and WeLab's future

Technology now makes it possible for banks to track and manage cash on an intra-day basis. Nadeem Shamim of SmartStream Technologies explains the benefits this brings to transaction bankers and their corporate clients – as well as the challenges of making this become an industry norm.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Nadeem Shamim, SmartStream Technologies

1:16 - Liquidity lessons from COVID-19

3:08 - Understanding counterparty risk

4:52 - Cash pledged, versus "pure" cash

7:15 - Reducing operational losses

11:31 - Managing market risks such as credit

12:45 - What being ready for intraday liquidity looks like

15:50 - From intraday positions to intraday valuations

18:20 - Being ready for open banking and APIs

OneDegree has spun a niche business doing digital pet insurance in Hong Kong into a multi-pronged insurtech business that aims to be active in five continents within five years. Co-founder and CEO Alvin Kwock discusses the changing trends in insurance and insurtech, and his ambitions to transform OneDegree into a leading insurance player.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Alvin Kwock, OneDegree

1:28 - The vision from Day One in 2016

7:14 - Getting started in pet insurance, the whys and hows

13:16 - Extending into B2B for third-party insurers

14:48 - What big insurance companies need from tech companies

16:55 - The challenges of partnering with giant legacy insurers

20:25 - Going global, can you maintain the same focus?

22:39 - Design pitfalls for insurance mobile apps

Banks are now expected to provide instant payments and other services on demand. Roland Brandli explains this is creating pressures on legacy core systems that must now be changed. He is head of digital payment controls at SmartStream Technologies, helping banks around the world from his base in Dubai.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Roland Brandli, SmartStream

1:03 - Unexpected impact of banks handling instant payments

2:15 - The problem with international standards

3:56 - Why systems aren't interoperable, yet

4:51 - Hidden costs, competitive issues for legacy I.T.

6:32 - Incumbent banks versus fintechs, neobanks with built-for-purpose tech stacks

8:34 - Choosing partners, understanding processes

9:45 - This is the turning point for legacy tech

13:50 - AI, blockchain, buzzwords versus real use cases

16:50 - From traditional silos to just-in-time processes

20:11 - Vendors also changing their tech stacks

22:10 - Dealing with the complexity of integrating control systems, eg APIs

24:03 - Lessons for banks from Facebook's big shutdown

Kelvin Teo is co-founder of Funding Societies, an SME-dedicated SaaS and platform lender, with operations in Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. He speaks with Jame DiBiasio about plans to securitize loans, obtain a banking license, and issue credit cards – and a path to IPO.

Timecodes:

0:00 - Kelvin Teo, Funding Societies

1:30 - P2P versus lending

3:55 - How it works in different markets

5:00 - Where do you get capital to lend?

5:55 - How much skin in the game do you take?

7:05 - Lessons from China on P2P and platform risks

8:40 - Plans to securitize loans, investor base, licensing

11:40 - What's next after not winning a virtual-bank license in Singapore

12:55 - Benefits to a bank license or partnership

14:55 - Competing against banks, ride hailing apps, ecommerce

16:20 - Challenges to growth

17:10 - Payments and credit-card strategy

19:20 - Drivers of new market entry

20:20 - Can you scale in Southeast Asia?

21:36 - Becoming profitable and exit strategy