Commentary

While the impact of Covid has been hard felt by the financial services industry both in Asia and globally, the resulting challenges have provided the stimulus for long-overdue innovation and digitisation when it comes to the technology banks rely upon to do business.

Climate change is the most urgent threat facing the world. It affects us all. The imminent risks are spelt out in detail in the recent IPCC Report, which was headlined around the world as “Code Red for Humanity.” The subsequent COP26 conference in Glasgow has seen world leaders agree on certain measures designed to reduce emissions and take concrete steps towards the decarbonisation of the world economy, including agreement on halting and even reversing deforestation. 

A Survey of Financial Services Firms.

Attributed to Gery Dachlan, Managing Director, South Asia and Australia, Avaloq.

Authentication and verification of consumers require flexibility, convenience, and security. But the onus has always been on the customer to prove their identity.

Increased regulatory interest in sustainability will require financial institutions to address its ESG strategy, risk management, regulatory compliance, and data challenges.

The accelerating impact of climate change is growing more evident by the day, necessitating substantial shifts in financial market structures and taxonomies in order to rapidly scale climate investments and achieve low-carbon targets. 

Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) has seen remarkable growth in recent years and is on track to achieve a global market value of US$700b by 2023. This 90% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) reflects the growing penetration of this simple transactional instrument—consumers purchasing a product now with the agreement to pay for it later.

The roadmap to success for many organizations has been defined by digital transformation. However, since the Covid-19 crisis started, organizations across many industries had to accelerate and redefine their plans to keep pace with the dramatic changes in the business landscape.

There is a revolution going on today in the banking industry. Those bastions of privacy and money management are doing the unthinkable - with consent, they are sharing their customer data with approved third parties. In the past, banks jealously safeguarded their clients’ information. That is what clients expected of them, as well as it being a regulatory obligation. Today, they are making this information available to other players in the financial services arena, creating an unprecedented financial ecosystem built around making their Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) available to approved third parties.  

The past decade has witnessed incredible innovation in global capital markets, and the rapid pace continues. Regulatory changes designed to seek risk mitigation and boost transparency as well as enhance asset stability have drastically changed the economics of capital market technology demands and business models.

According to Singapore’s largest bank DBS, the volume of cash deposits and withdrawals fell by an unprecedented 11% in the first 3 months of 2020, a 6% fall from where the figure had been since 2017. Coupled with extraordinary growth in the adoption of e-payments, it’s safe to say that COVID-19 has altered consumer behaviour—and fast. 

HSBC, Goldman Sachs, and Citi are all eyeing a piece of the region's trillion-dollar financial market.

For years, banks treated online banking as an afterthought. A website and a mobile app were necessities, but creating a digital channel that fully serviced customers wasn’t a priority. When COVID-19 struck, customers of all demographics completely switched to online banking -- and most won’t go back. Digital banking is no longer an additional channel. From now on, digital is the default.

 Latest Trends in LIBOR Transitions in Japan

Agent Banking is getting more popular in the rural areas of Bangladesh. More number of agents and outlets are seen these days as their numbers have grown by 15.69% and 12.59% respectively in September 2020 compared to September 2019 even amid COVID-19, according to data from the country’s central bank, Bank Bangladesh (BB)