This Week in Fintech ending 22 October 2021

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This Week in Fintech ending 22 October 2021

22 October 2021 Technology & Digitalization 0

This week our experts brought you the following insights based on their experience as investors, entrepreneurs & executives.

Monday Ilias Hatzis our Greece-based crypto entrepreneur (Founder & CEO at  Kryptonio a “keyless” non-custodial bitcoin and cryptocurrency wallet, that lets users manage bitcoin and crypto, without private keys or passwords and Weekly Columnist at Daily Fintech) @iliashatzis wrote Everyone is building a wallet

I was not surprised by Square’s decision to enter the crypto wallet business. In June, at the Bitcoin 2021 Conference in Miami, Jack Dorsey revealed that Square was toying with the idea of a hardware wallet, in order to make bitcoin custody more mainstream. In August, Facebook revealed that it is ready to launch its Novi digital wallet, but it’s on hold until it obtains the necessary regulatory approvals. A few weeks ago, I read that Robinhood is testing a new crypto wallet and cryptocurrency transfer features for its app. Robinhood is planning to allow its customers to send and receive digital currencies off its platform. Today, Robinhood allows users to buy cryptocurrencies, but to be able to send and receive crypto along with paying for things like NFTs in crypto, you need to have a wallet. In April, Revolut started to let users send crypto to external wallets, but they can’t receive coins, since they haven’t issued individual wallets yet and cryptocurrencies are stored in a pooled virtual currency account. With more than 100 crypto wallets and growing, this sector is getting crowded. Everyone wants to play a direct role in the $2.5 trillion crypto market.

Editor note: What is worse, for your money to be stolen or lost? For the person it is the same. 

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Tuesday Bernard Lunn, CEO of Daily Fintech and author of The Blockchain Economy wrote: Part 3 Competition to Ether from Bitcoin and “wannabees”.

Ethereum is perceived as better than Bitcoin because it can run smart contracts. The inconvenient truth for Ethereum fans is that you can also run smart contracts on the Bitcoin blockchain and the innovation in this space looks vibrant with projects such as Sphinx on the Lightning Network and Stacks (fka Blockstack).

There are also many blockchain platforms positioning as competition to Ethereum.

Editor note:this part 3 will annoy those who have invested in the altcoins who I  have denigrated in the title with the word “wannabees”.

Wednesday Alan Scott Managing Director EMEA at 24 Exchange @Alan_SmartMoney wrote his weekly roundup of Stablecoin news.

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Thursday

Rintu Patnaik, an Insurtech expert based in India, wrote: Largest Indian Bank Deftly Scales Its Embedded Platform

Until the end of this decade, Asia is expected to account for half of global consumption growth, presenting a $10 trillion opportunity. Half of upper-middle income households are expected in Asia, with one in every two consumer transactions likely to be generated from the region. The consumer markets are changing with new growth avenues for financial services players. While in Y2K, 15% of Asia’s population constituted the consuming class, by 2030, 70% of Asia’s total population may be part of the consuming class. Digital ecosystems are mushrooming across Asia with highly integrated super apps that offer a one-stop-shop for a range of services. Although super apps emerged in China, Asian economies including India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, and Vietnam now have leading super app players.

Editor note: Rintu does a deep dive into the tech/biz strategy behind one of India’s & Asia’s growth stars.

Christian Dreyer @x3er, the Swiss based CFA who focusses on how XBRL changes our world wrote his weekly roundup of XBRL news.

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Friday Howard Tolman, a well-known banker, technologist and entrepreneur in London, wrote his weekly roundup of Alt Lending news.

Bernard Lunn, CEO of Daily Fintech and author of The Blockchain Economy wrote: Is Affirm ($AFRM) the growth star of Fintech 50 Index due to winning in the BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) market? 

Affirm is a publicly traded stock in the Fintech 50 Index that could be the winner in the BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) segment of the Fintech market.

Affirm was not the first innovator in BNPL. That prize goes to Klarna which we first covered in 2014 (mentioning Affirm as a follower). The market winner is not necessarily the first innovator – think Facebook beating myspace.

Editor note: Answer to the headline question is wait and see. In theory Affirm ($AFRM) is a leading player in a hot market but we will have to see how quarter to quarter growth plays out to see if Affirm ($AFRM) is a real growth star.

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