Acorns’ machine-learning feature to help millennials save money
Venture capital 3.0: the initial coin offering explained
The venture capital community thrives on disruption. So what happens when the tables are turned and the medicine bottle has their name on it? There’s a new kid riding onto the financing block – riding roughshod across an unregulated landscape. Welcome to the world of the initial coin offering (ICO). An ICO is a hybrid: part crowdfunding, part software token, part speculation. In simple terms, an ICO is often described, somewhat inaccurately, as an IPO for cryptocurrencies. How it works – A tech start-up team creates an ICO using a blockchain-enabled software platform, usually open sourced. – The platform is powered by cryptography-based software tokens – called cryptocurrencies. – The […]
Frenzy pushes bitcoin to all-time highs
Bitcoin’s price has soared to all-time highs over the past few days, rising above $US1300 late on Friday, then $US1400 yesterday, and even $US1500 on one major exchange, amid a surge of speculative investment across the cryptocurrency sector. Bitcoin has been struggling with a seemingly intractable internecine debate over network scaling, while similar projects have been drawing talent and investment dollars. But the price in 2017 has been generally rising, and rising sharply, amid several factors. Not all of the factors, ultimately, may turn out to be positive. At $US1400, bitcoin would be up 44 per cent for the year to date, according to the Bitcoin Price Index published by […]
China giant Tencent funds Melbourne fintech start-up
Melbourne-based fintech start-up Airwallex has landed a $US13 million Series A funding round, becoming one of the first Australian companies to raise money from China’s biggest internet company, Tencent. Airwallex, which is building a new foreign exchange payment network, raised funding from the world’s fourth-biggest internet company, along with Sequoia Capital China and Mastercard. “We’ve built a digital banking layer and a digital compliance layer across traditional banking infrastructure,” co-founder and CEO Jack Zhang told The Australian. “You can think of us as a payment network; we’re offering a faster, cheaper way of making payments happen.” Airwallex lets businesses issue and pay invoices in their preferred currency at the mid-market […]
BGL & SelfWealth team up to provide value added services for Accountants
BGL Corporate Solutions and SelfWealth have teamed up to provide free value added services for Simple Fund 360 clients. SelfWealth, Australia’s only flat fee brokerage solution is now fully integrated with Simple Fund 360; Australia’s leading SMSF cloud solution. The integration gives Accountants free access to SelfWealth’s fixed fee trading solution, portfolio construction tools and stock research powered by Thomson Reuters with the ability to extend these services to their clients. “The integration is well timed” said Ron Lesh, Managing Director of BGL. “With the early adopters of Simple Fund 360 experiencing significant time savings through automation, they are now looking to expand their services to provide more value to […]
Become a property investor for just $57 with BRICKX
Australians can now invest in an apartment in Darlinghurst for just $57 with BRICKX. BRICKX CEO Anthony Millet said it’s the lowest Brick price yet. “We’re thrilled to offer investors a share in this inner-Sydney property at such a low price point,” Mr Millet said. “With the Brick price starting at just $57, BRICKX continues to strive to make property investment affordable for all Australians”. BRICKX breaks down traditional barriers that exist when it comes to investing in residential real estate by dividing properties into 10,000 units or “Bricks”. Investors may then earn capital returns and monthly net rental income in proportion to the number of […]
Advisers urged to dump simplistic advice to drive growth
Financial planners need to be prepared to shed some clients and rebuild their value proposition if they are to achieve sustainable growth, according to a new white paper released by Matrix Planning Solutions and ClearView Financial Advice. The whitepaper, which has drawn on the experiences of Matrix advisers, argues that for financial planners to deal with the competitive pressures being driven by robo-advice and industry superannuation funds, they need to deliver a better value proposition. “In order for advisers to remain compliant and secure in their position as trusted adviser, they must continuously add value,” it said. “The way to continuously add value is to delve deeper into their clients’ […]
Macquarie’s plan to beat the investment robots
Investing robots and index funds are poaching billions of dollars from human fund managers, but Macquarie Investment Management head of the Americas Shawn Lytle says the firm is repositioning to cope with the seismic shift into passive investing. Globally, droves of investors are yanking money from high-fee active managers and parking their funds in passive strategies such as exchange-traded funds that ride the ups and downs of select markets. Macquarie Investment Management, a global division which manages about $US257 billion of Macquarie Group’s $US362 billion in assets under management, is aiming to differentiate by offering more unique actively managed equities, bonds and alternative assets such as infrastructure. “We are at […]
