Private equity rises to IBM’s blockchain cloud
Global fund administrator Northern Trust plans to seek approval from the Australian Securities and Investments Commission for a blockchain that promises to reduce administration costs for private equity funds and their investors. Chicago-based Northern Trust said on Wednesday it and technology giant IBM had created the first blockchain for the private equity market. The synchronised database will overhaul traditionally spreadsheet-based processes used by PE investors, managers, administrators, regulators, advisors and auditors that require extensive reconciliation. While various pilots and proofs of concept of blockchain are being tested across the global financial system, this project is significant because the distributed ledger, hosted in the IBM Cloud, is already live. It is […]
Monash teams with Cambridge and Tsinghua universities to study Asia’s alternative finance sector
Monash University is collaborating with Cambridge University and China’s Tsinghua University to track the extraordinary growth of the Asia-Pacific’s booming alternative finance sector, valued at more than US$100 billion. The collaboration will see Monash Business School’s Australian Centre for Financial Studies partner with the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance at University of Cambridge Judge Business School, and Tsinghua University Graduate School at Shenzhen to undertake an international benchmarking survey with the support of more than 20 major industry organisations across the region. This is the largest regional study to date focused on crowdfunding, peer-to-peer lending and other forms of alternative finance. The benchmarking survey aims to capture the key trends, […]
Moneysoft grows team to strengthen capabilities
Australian financial technology company, Moneysoft, has boosted its capabilities as a leading provider of Personal Financial Management solutions with four key appointments. Miles Casbier and Indra Bhosale join Moneysoft’s sales team with a wealth of experience in financial services and client relationship management. Craig Fletcher joins the team to head up process and delivery management and Ann Cook joins Moneysoft’s marketing team to help drive growth and continue building the company’s strong presence in the financial planning market. Moneysoft MD and Founder, Peter Malekas said: “At a time when our business is experiencing significant growth, these key appointments allow us to bolster our overall service proposition for existing and new […]
Fintech set to reshape financial services despite slump
Global fintech investment’s boom year of 2015, when all the planets aligned and the hype factor reached its peak, was always going to make activity levels in subsequent years look feeble by comparison. Even so, the 47 per cent slump in funds invested in 2016 to $24.7bn, revealed yesterday in KPMG’s Pulse of Fintech publication, is eye-opening. Both macro and micro forces are at play. With the former, the uncertainty created by the Brexit vote, the schism between new US president Donald Trump and the tech community, a perceived economic slowdown in China and significant fluctuations in exchange rates all conspired to make investors more cautious. At a more micro […]
Optimo Financial releases changes to super software
Sydney-based fintech firm, Optimo Financial is releasing new alterations for its Pathfinder Online superannuation strategy software, ahead of the super changes legislated to apply from 1 July this year. Optimo Financial chief executive, Hugh Bannister, said that the optimisation technology which underpinned the Pathfinder Online software and incorporated tax law, super legislation, family tax benefits, and the Age Pension, would overhaul in time to include changes from the Fair and Sustainable Superannuation Bill. “We can develop, test and deploy legislative changes very quickly in Pathfinder,” Bannister said of the alterations to the software. “We believe we are the first software provider to include the recent super changes.” Optimo Financial would […]
Australia weathers fintech slump
Global investment in fintech companies almost halved last year as “froth” comes out of the burgeoning industry and investors wait to see if they can successfully disrupt incumbents such as banks and insurers, according to a new report. Fintech investment funding declined to $US24.7 billion ($32.17bn) last year from a bumper $US46.7bn in 2015, driven by fewer merger and acquisitions, and private equity investments, KPMG found. However, the less mature Australian fintech industry bucked the trend as investment soared to a record high of $626 million last year, up from $185m in 2015 and $461m in 2014. The increase was powered by Champ Private Equity’s acquisition of Pepperstone, Stirling Products’ […]
It’s Apple Pay day for ING Direct
ING Direct signed up more than 20,000 customers to Apple Pay within 24 hours of going live with the digital wallet, claiming banks must partner and embrace a broader digital “ecosystem” or risk falling by the wayside. After going live with Apple Pay on Tuesday morning, ING chief Uday Sareen yesterday said 21,500 customers had activated the payments functionality on their iPhones, surpassing expectations of about 10,000. He said the bank’s account acquisition numbers were 25 per cent higher on Tuesday than the rolling average of the prior 30 days. ING has 517,000 customers who could activate Apple Pay, but only about 70 per cent use iPhones and only the […]
Empowering advisers to embrace social media
A recent Midwinter and Jenesis industry survey revealed just under half of the respondents had chosen not to engage in social media because of the associated risk to their business reputation. Kaplan Professional and Red Marker have been developing the Artemis solution to help financial advisers create and share compliant digital content. Artemis detects ‘risky’ content as it is being created, helping advisers and licensees to identify and remediate compliance risks associated with the promotion of financial products or services. The innovative solution is able to identify risk across a range of media types including web pages, Word documents, PDF’s, and client communications. Artemis is also able […]
