In this weeks issue:
- Open banking vs closed for innovation
- The new economy has an old problem
- Bakkt to the future
- Innovation methods by the baker’s dozen
- DLT’d Down Under
- Alex, I’ll take intimate for 3,874%
Cough, “open banking”, cough: The debate about open banking seems to have quietly disappeared in Canada. After all, consumers supposedly don’t trust the term open banking according to a recent report. It seems a bit ironic for cries of “no unicorns” from all quarters when even innovative fintechs are facing barriers to innovation in Canadian banking.
The Brits on the other hand aren’t wasting any time. With London as a long standing financial center, there is a constant push to expand the advantages of open banking to transform Fintech with a regulatory ‘scalebox’. Some are even making the claim that legacy financial institutions in the UK that fail to embrace APIs ‘face an existential threat’.
Which may be true. The competition for the customer is fierce. But this comes down to a dual of visions about the future of banking. The question is, can Canada afford to hog tie our fintech innovators while the UK, Europe and Asia develop the next generation of finance?
Can Canadians afford not to reflect on what the future of banking might look like?
Kickstarter, union buster?: Lots of talk about union organization at Kickstarter, but no reason why one is necessary. There’s been some firings. Some accusations. Oh the drama. Is this the beginning of the end of the mighty Kickstarter platform?
Price discovery is a ***: Jeff Sprecher started 20 years ago with a buck and a debt laden platform. In the years since he’s transformed power trading, acquired numerous exchanges including the NYSE, bought or developed a global clearing network, created the all electronic ICE futures platform. Now he’s involved in Bitcoin. But Bakkt wasn’t the overnight success some people were expecting. Old school traders call it Buy the rumour, sell the news
Methods of Innovation: UK’s NESTA (National Endowment for Science Technology and Arts) has put together a report exploring various innovation methods that they have studied and contributed to.
These include:
- Accelerator programmes
- Anticipatory regulation
- Challenge prizes
- Crowdfunding
- Experimentation
- Futures
- Impact investment
- Innovation mapping
- People Powered Results: the 100 day challenge
- Prototyping
- Public and social innovation labs
- Scaling grants for social innovations
- Standards of Evidence
NESTA’s 13 Modern Ways to Innovate
CHESS gets DLT’d: No, this isn’t a headline for an Aussie rules football game. Rather, it’s a permissioned ledger without a consensus mechanism being explored by the ASX in Australia. In two short podcasts, listen to the Industry and Regulatory Perspectives of the Distributed Ledger Technology ASX Implementation
Intimacy for 3,874%: Lots of interesting Canadian businesses ranked, with Fintechs sprinkled throughout. Check out the 3 year revenue growth of almost 4000% for intimate apparel company Knix. How many of Canada’s Boldest 400 Firms have you heard of?
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Have questions or want to get involved? Fire us an email at: info@ncfacanada.org.
Have an incredible week...NCFA