Australia Post signs on its first businesses with its Digital ID
Online job marketplace Airtasker, credit union CUA, foreign exchange company Travelex, and Queensland Police are among the first adopters of Australia Post’s new digital identity service as it seeks to corner the local market in proving credentials when the online and physical worlds collide. The Digital ID has been under development since early 2016 and will allow people to rapidly verify their identity via their smartphone using stored biometric data and other information. The technology will allow individuals to apply for passports or mortgage by mobile and Australia Post’s executive general manager of trusted e-commerce services Andrew Walduck said it was now entering commercial use and would become a growth […]
Bipartisan push for the Reserve Bank to back Australian bitcoin
Labor and Coalition senators have crossed the political divide to call on the Reserve Bank to embrace bitcoins as an official form of currency or risk the future competitiveness of Australia’s $145 billion a year financial services industry. The push from Labor senator Sam Dastyari and Liberal senator Jane Hume comes after the digital currency soared to an all time high of $4070 per bitcoin on Monday, up from less than 10¢ per coin in 2010. Senator Dastyari said when he first raised bitcoin in the Senate, one of his colleagues came to him and said: ‘I don’t get what the issue is, don’t they just melt all the coin […]
Wealth begins its blockchain reaction
Ambitious financial services firms are driving Australia’s global leadership in the development of blockchain technology, which is already delivering productivity and innovation benefits to the nation’s trillion-dollar wealth industry. BNP Paribas Securities Services has progressively stepped up its blockchain expertise in the Australian market because it sees a nation filled with opportunities. BNP Paribas global head of securities services, Patrick Colle, says Australia has been a business investment stronghold because in many areas it is “the most advanced in the world.” Colle says an important attribute making Australia one of the most sophisticated global markets on blockchain is the initiative of the ASX to replace its dated CHESS clearing and […]
zipMoney secures $40M strategic investment and relationship with Westpac
zipMoney Limited (ASX: ZML) is pleased to announce that it has secured a $40 million strategic investment in the Company from Westpac Banking Corporation (ASX: WBC) by way of a private share placement. Westpac and Zip have also entered a strategic relationship which allows the parties to explore the integration of Zip’s products and services across Westpac’s network throughout Australia. As part of the strategic relationship, the parties will explore other initiatives including the provision of currently in-development business-to-business products and services to Westpac. The WBC strategic investment will be by way of a $40 million ordinary equity investment comprising the subscription of 49,382,716 fully paid ordinary zipMoney shares at […]
Will property crowdfunding take off in Australia?
Investors who feel bewildered by the ever-changing regulations on bank loans and costly mortgages should consider entering the Australian property market through crowdfunding. A new study conducted by the University of South Australia (UniSA) in partnership with DomaCom, suggests that crowdfunding could become a viable new vehicle for investors trying to make headway into the country’s increasingly challenging property market. Braam Lowies, the study’s lead researcher, noted that while the concept was relatively new in Australia, it had been successful in the United States and United Kingdom for approximately seven years. Young investors should consider crowdfunding A survey conducted as part of the study showed that crowdfunding attracted a mix […]
Bitcoin surpasses milestone price of USD$3000 across global exchanges
Bitcoin has finally surpassed the US$3000 per BTC average across global exchanges. In fact, it didn’t stop there and touched an all-time high of $3230 during the start of August 5. The decentralized cryptocurrency now commands a hefty $51.9 billion market cap while trading platforms are currently seeing intense exchange volumes at $1.6 billion USD/BTC trades over the past 24-hours. On August 5 bitcoin surpassed the $3000 USD per BTC threshold on the trading platform Bitstamp. Smashing the $3000 vantage point was not enough for bitcoin as BTC prices touched an all-time high of $3230. At press time one BTC is roughly $3150 as traders take some profits from the […]
Advice practices need to pay attention to next disrupters
Managed accounts, robo-advice, and scaled advice are going to be the norm in the next two to three years, Netwealth believes. Presenting at Money Management’s Fintech, Platform and Wraps conference on Thursday, Netwealth head of managed accounts – strategy and development, Steve Thomas said advice businesses were not fully across technologies that were available. Thomas said 29 per cent of advisers were using some level of scaled advice and 31 per cent expected to use it in 12 to 18 months. “They recognise that scaled advice can certainly help in the ongoing management of their clients,” he said. “The interesting part is for those 29 per cent using it, 40 […]
Blockchain Explained: What you need to know
As emerging technologies continue to revolutionise the way we live and transact, concepts like ‘cryptocurrency’ and ‘blockchain’ are becoming increasingly relevant to our collective financial future. Major banks are already talking about and beginning to use blockchain, a technology that could drive the digital transactions of the future. And it’s become a major buzzword in financial circles around the world for its potential to change the exchange of value as we currently know it. While the technology itself is in the very early stages of existence and is complicated to understand, businesses and entrepreneurs around the globe are looking at ways to effectively use it in the belief that blockchain […]
