The Tezos Foundation has unanimously appointed Ryan Jesperson and Michel Mauny to the Board. The two new members will replace Johann Gevers and Diego Olivier Fernandez Pons, who decided to voluntarily step down to optimally support the Foundation for the advancement of its mission. The two new members of the Board will join Lars Haussmann, who was appointed to the Board on 31 January 2018.  Ryan Jesperson will replace Johann Gevers as President.He plans to relocate with his family to Zug, Switzerland. Ryan Jesperson and Michel Mauny, who will join Lars Haussmann as new members to the Board,. Ryan Jesperson…

Regtech is entering a new phase of development and adoption as the sector evolves from niche to mainstream, according to new study by Burnmark and Alvarez & Marsal. The report, titled Regtech 2.0, focuses on the emerging trends in regtech and explores the sector landscape from the perspectives of startups, regulators and banks. It has been compiled using interviews of industry participants. According to the study, more collaboration between regtech firms and banks as well as regulators are expected to take place in the years to come as the sector transitions into a new phase of growth. “Implementation success in…

Peer-to-peer (P2P) lending has become an increasingly important source of funding for individuals and businesses in the UK, especially smaller businesses. Lending volumes among the country’s major P2P lending platforms increased by two thirds in 2016, and by the end of 2017, the cumulative total surpassed £8 billion, according to data from trade body the Peer-to-Peer Financial Association (P2PFA). Out of the £2.9 billion lent through online platforms in 2017, £1.9 billion went towards businesses, highlighting the growing importance of the alternative financing method for SMEs in the UK. “P2P lending has brought about real benefits, not only for the…

The age of digitisation has caused fundamental shifts in how banking is done is this day and age. Bankers need to rethink their business models and strategies to remain relevant. This is especially true when it comes to open banking, no bank is able to offer precise personalisation of their services as much as the tech giants like Apple, Google or Tencent and Alibaba can with their platforms. Open banking provides an avenue for banks to thrive in today’s competitive landscape, the PS2D regulation will further propel banks towards and open banking concept, the question is are Swiss Banks ready…

Die Schweiz nimmt bei der mobilen Bezahlung in Europa eine Spitzenstellung ein. Dafür gibt es diverse Gründe. Zum einen liegt die Popularität der Lösung in dem stetig wachsenden Anteil des Onlinehandels. Hier sind einfache wie technisch ausgereifte und vor allem sichere Lösungen gefragt. Zu diesem Schluss kommt eine Studie der Wirtschaftsprüfer von Deloitte. Demnach bezahlt inzwischen fast jeder fünfte Schweizer wenigstens gelegentlich per Smartphone, während es in Deutschland lediglich drei Prozent sind. Vergleichbar niedrig sind die Zahlen auch in übrigen europäischen Staaten wie Frankreich, Italien oder Belgien. Nur in Skandinavien ist der Anteil der Nutzer von Mobile Payment höher. Zwar…

Die Digitalisierung der Kundenbeziehungen steht in vielen Bereichen noch am Anfang, dabei würden sich die Kunden eine Ausweitung wünschen. Noch fehlen aber die entsprechenden Angebote. Besonders gross ist das Innovationspotenzial in der Versicherungsbranche (inklusive Krankenversicherer), aber auch die Banken haben in einigen Bereichen noch Nachholbedarf. Dies sind einige der zentralen Erkenntnisse aus einer Umfrage, die das Marktforschungsunternehmen GFK im Auftrag des Digitalisierungsspezialisten ti&m in der Schweiz und in Deutschland durchgeführt hat. Spitzenreiter unter den digitalisierten Diensten in der Schweiz ist das Onlinebanking: 91 Prozent der Umfrageteilnehmer nutzen eine entsprechende Dienstleistung. Ebenfalls hoher Akzeptanz erfreuen sich Online-Tickets für den Personenverkehr (75…

Forbes have selected their Top 50 Fintech List for 2018. With Shapeshift also one Swiss Fintech made it into the list. Acorns, Irvine CA Category: Investing, Personal Finance, Consumers Funding: $101 million Acorns is the first company to offer micro investing to the world. The proprietary financial engine allows customers to roundup spare change from everyday purchases and invest these sub-dollar amounts into a professionally managed portfolio of index funds. Addepar, Mountain View, CA Category: Investing, Data & Analytics, Wall Street Funding: $215 million Cloud-based software that allows financial advisors to track and analyze all of a client’s…

Crowdfunding is on the rise in Switzerland. Both the number of successfully funded campaigns and the volume of funds raised have experienced strong growth in recent years. In 2016, CHF 128.2 million was raised through 3,098 campaigns. That’s a 362% increase from 2015, according to the Crowdfunding Monitoring Switzerland 2017 report by the Institute of Financial Services Zug IFZ of the Lucerne School of Business. The volume has risen more than tenfold in comparison to 2013. The highest growth between 2015 and 2016 was posted by crowdlending with 597% to CHF 55.1 million, followed by crowdinvesting with 453% to CHF…

2018 promises to be another great year for fintech in Switzerland. This year again, Switzerland will be hosting some of the largest and most anticipated fintech events and conferences in the world. Here are some of the top fintech events to attend in 2018: Panel discussion with Switzerland’s Top Fintech Accelerators Spaces, Zurich Bleicherweg February 13, 2018 This panel discussion with Switzerland’s leading fintech accelerators will explore together their models, their experiences, and discuss the key learnings over the past two years, debate around sustainable models for programs, explore the relative strength of each program, and share tips for…

The four finalists for the 2018 Swiss Fintech Awards have been announced. Proxeus and VIAC are competing for the 2018’s Early Stage Startup Of The Year award, and Loanboox and PriceHubble are competing for the Growth Stage Startup Of The Year award. This is the third edition of the Swiss Fintech Awards, a competition that aims to recognize the most innovative startups and influencers in the Swiss fintech space. The four finalists were selected amongst the ten nominees that made the cut in late-December. These cover varied areas ranging from from regtech, insurtech, to blockchain and proptech. The winners will…

Fintech has exploded over the past couple years. Several successful fintech startups have emerged and fed the trend, fueling at the same time the rise of fintech accelerators and incubators. Below are a few of the top fintech accelerators and incubators in Europe. Startupbootcamp Fintech Startupbootcamp is a global network of industry-focused startup accelerators. It currently has 17 accelerator programs across 11 cities. In Europe, Startupbootcamp runs annual programs in locations such as Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen, Dublin and Haifa. Each program of Startupbootcamp focuses on a specific industry. The Startupbootcamp Fintech Accelerator program runs in Singapore, Mumbai, New York,…

Canadian startup Street Contxt has developed a platform that aims to address the current inefficiencies in the flow of information in the capital markets by bringing clarity to the current content chaos. Founded in 2012, Street Contxt provides a content management platform that allows traders, sales people, desk analysts and research analysts, to easily organize, manage, distribute and track engagement in their desk commentary, research reports and news updates. Using proprietary, smart data technology and machine learning, the platform allows sell side content producers to figure out what research is resonating with clients, and match the right people with the…

SWIFT’s FIN traffic rose to an all-time high of 7.1 billion messages in 2017, fuelled by double-digit growth in global payments. While SWIFT’s FIN traffic grew by 9% over the year, FIN Payment traffic rose by 12%, driven by growth across all regions and the adoption of SWIFT’s gpi service. With an average of 28.14 million messages a day SWIFT also recorded new peak traffic days in 2017, processing 32.84 million FIN messages on 30th November – 8% above the 2016 peak of 30.4 million messages. At the same time, SWIFT continued to deliver on its day-to-day mandate: operational availability performance during 2017 exceeded targets. SWIFT…

Johann Gevers, the president of the Tezos Foundation, has committed to “step back” from his role once the project is back on track with a new board. The statement comes after months of tensions and public feud with the project’s founders. Blockchain project Tezos raised more than US$230 million in July 2017 in one of the year’s most successful initial coin offerings (ICOs). But the project was quickly derailed by quarreling between founders Arthur and Kathleen Breitman, who control the code, and the Tezos Foundation, which controls the funds. The feud between Gevers and the Breitmans dates back to October…

Switzerland has a world-renowned reputation for its financial services and banking sector. Now, with the Swiss fintech scene accelerating and the impressive quality of its startups, foreign players and industry experts have taken notice. An internationally-oriented financial center Switzerland has a strong, internationally-oriented financial center and has maintained close financial relations with its peers. According to Deloitte, in Europe, only the UK, French and Swiss regulators have signed fintech cooperation agreements with other regulators across the globe. These agreements aim to deepen bilateral cooperation and enable regulators from the two countries to exchange views on domestic and international financial market…

A globally fintech hub, London has been on the forefront of financial innovation, fueled by its supportive government, advanced financial services sector and burgeoning tech ecosystem. This year again, London will be hosting some of the world’s largest fintech gatherings and events that are set to bring together major stakeholders in the space. Here are some of the most anticipated fintech events to take place in London this year: Fintech for Social Good: A Look at Property Crowdfunding January 16, 2018 Birkbeck, University of London, Torrington Square, Clore Management Centre Zeeshan Uppal, co-founder of Yielders, a crowdfunding property investment…

As cryptocurrencies gain popularity, scalability issues and high transaction fees have forced Swiss startup Lykke to switch from a semi-decentralized to a centralized operational mode. The transition for Bitcoin trading wallets occurred in late-December 2017, while the transition for Ethereum trading wallets took place on January 03, 2017. Lykke’s decision to breach its own promise of offering “the world’s first truly decentralized exchange” came following scalability challenges that have risen with the surge in cryptocurrency adoption and trading. This has caused mining fees and transaction times to skyrocket. “Lykke is currently the only exchange to be semi-decentralized and to offer…

Fintechs in Germany Overview graphic by paymentbanking including link collection sorted by fintech categories. German FinTech Overview Link collection: Payment https://www.payleven.de https://www.sumup.de https://www.izettle.com/de http://www.go4q.mobi http://www.ipayst.com/de/ http://www.kesh.de (nur noch bis 30.11) https://www.paycash.eu SQWallet http://www.payworksmobile.com https://www.billpay.de https://www.laterpay.net http://www.paywithatweet.com https://www.payorshare.de https://www.paylax.de http://www.optiopay.com/de/ https://www.spendit.de https://payment.billingmaker.com/ http://www.dimoco.at https://www.transferwise.com/de https://www.circle.com/de  https://www.easycarpay.com Bitcoins https://www.bitbond.com https://www.bitcoin.de https://www.satoshipay.io https://www.draglet.com/en coinzone = www.coinify.com (Acquisition) http://www.dogecoin.com https://www.pey.de https://www.coinsnap.eu/de/public/ https://www.btcexpress.net/DE https://www.cointed.com/ E-Commerce https://www.paymill.com/de = http://klikandpay.com/de/ (Acquistion) https://www.barzahlen.de/de/ https://www.ratepay.com https://www.payever.de https://www.betterpayment.de http://www.allpago.com https://www.sepaone.com http://www.fashioncheque.com/ http://klikandpay.com/de/ http.//getgrover.con/de-de  Accounting https://www.smoice.com http://www.billomat.com https://www.weclapp.com/de/ https://www.debitoor.de Pactas = https://www.billwerk.com (Rebranding) https://www.fastbill.com/ https://www.zeitgold.com http://www.smacc.io https://www.albuswhite.com http://www.candis.io/de/ http://www.isaac10.com (Insolvency) Fastbill Automatic = http://www.monsum.com (Rebranding) https://www.salesking.eu/ Factoring / Collection https://www.billfront.com http://www.rechnung48.de https://www.pagido.de https://www.decimo.de https://www.ecollect.de https://www.flexpayment.de https://www.pairfinance.com http://www.trustbills.com https://www.collect.ai/ https://www.innolend.de/  http://www.factoringbörse.de https://www.fundflow.de/ https://www.bezahlt.de/…

Insurtechs enable insurance carriers to innovate much faster than they do today. Their innovative solutions dramatically improve the primary process of insurance carriers; they take away the frictions that customers experience when dealing with an insurance firm. We believe that connecting insurance executives with insurtech leaders will increase the relevancy of insurers. It will close the gap between what customers expect and insurers offer. New digital technologies also result in dropping market entry barriers and allow the emergence of new business models. This article features ten insurtechs that look beyond the current frictions and the current primary process. They understand…

Im Zuge des digitalen Wandels sehen sich traditionelle Unternehmen mit einer völlig neuen Konkurrenz konfrontiert: Nicht mehr nur die bisherigen Wettbewerber, sondern branchenfremde Player wie die grossen Tech-Konzerne aus dem Silicon Valley und junge Startups greifen die etablierten Unternehmen der Old Economy disruptiv in ihrem Geschäftsmodell an. Was die Medienbranche bereits schmerzlich erfahren musste, droht auch anderen Branchen und Industrien. Beispiele wie Uber, Airbnb und Netflix zeigen eindrucksvoll, wie Startups durch intuitive digitale Services die Schnittstelle zum Kunden besetzen und damit bestehende Geschäftsmodelle obsolet machen. Und: nicht nur im Silicon Valley entstehen solche Player – auch in unseren Breitengraden gibt…