Perth firm claims to have created first Australian blockchain
Perth company Ledger Assets says it has created the first Australian blockchain and slashed the amount of energy used by the revolutionary technology. Blockchain technology underpins the bitcoin virtual currency and a worldwide race is on to find other uses in areas from stock exchange settlements and financial transactions to medical records and art, energy and wine trading. Ledger Assets’ blockchain is already supporting another Perth startup – Power Ledger – which is trialling peer-to-peer trading of surplus household solar power which has the potential to further disrupt the centralised power grid. Ledger Assets is also exploring further opportunities in the arts, medical records and insurance sectors using its pioneering […]
SocietyOne’s Jason Yetton backs Maile Carnegie on fintech disruption threat
The former head of Westpac’s retail bank Jason Yetton has backed the call by ANZ’s new head of digital banking Maile Carnegie, who says that big banks will have to lift the pace of innovation in order to fend off disruption from fintech companies seeking a slice of their billions of dollars of profits. In his first speech as chief executive of peer-to-peer lender SocietyOne five months into the job, Mr Yetton said that UBS’s recent forecast of growth in P2P lending activity over the next 12 months of between 47 per cent and 150 per cent was an “increasing possibility” given recent market traction. Australian banks would be disrupted […]
Money for nothing, cheques for free in the sharing economy
THE bank of mum and dad is receiving a welcome cash injection as a growing number of households put a price on the things they previously gave away for free. More households are renting out a spare room, car sharing, selling goods and services and even lending to each other as the “sharing economy’’ expands, research shows. According to polling by RateSetter, some households are earning up to $120 a month. On the downside, however, all those people who benefited from the “free economy” are now having to wait their turn, or pay for it. Free rides, spare rooms, and even the kids’ old books and toys are increasingly thin […]
P2P lifts in popularity amid miserable year for banks
With deposit rates at low levels and the local share market still choppy, peer-to-peer lending has become an interesting alternative for Australian investors over the last few years. But some cracks in the model appeared in the US recently when one of the biggest peer-to-peer platforms was caught up in a scandal that it is now scrambling to fix, offering a warning for the Australian industry about the importance of transparency. LendingClub had been seen as one of the leading lights of this space in the US, amid a range of players that use technology to match investors with borrowers, cutting out the overheads incurred by banks and aiming to […]
Financial Leaders share their strategies to maintain their edge in the new era of Lending
Next Generation Lending 2016 16-18 August | Radisson Blu Hotel Sydney Australia is experiencing phenomenal growth in FinTech, with its alternative finance market growing by 320 per cent in 2015. With the industry’s wealth of talent and investment, it has successfully engaged the government and the regulator, ASIC to actively work together to promote innovation and digital disruption in financial services. So how is this evolving financial ‘revolution’ changing the traditional lending business model, who has the competitive edge and how is the industry benefitting as a whole? The 2nd annual Next Generation Lending conference, taking place in Sydney this August, will provide an in-depth look at how new […]
Fintech needs security baked in from the start
Fintech has been labelled a modern day gold rush fuelled by ambitious entrepreneurs and innovative technologies and consumer demand. KPMG and CB Insights’ “The Pulse of Fintech”report found that global investment in fintech currently sits at $13.8 billion with $4.5bn invested in the Asia-Pacific, across 140 deals. But as the relationship between new technologies, such as bitcoin and blockchain, and financial services deepens, so do the threats posed by increasingly sophisticated hackers. No market is more affected by cybercrime than financial services. PricewaterhouseCoopers’ 2016 Global Economic Crime Survey found that 48 per cent of financial sector respondents reported to have been affected by cybercrime, compared with 36 per cent across […]
FinTech Solutions For Enhanced Income and Economic Growth
Small business plays an important role in innovation and employment, so financial mechanisms that make it easier for small business to grow must be welcomed. P2P Business Lenders are intent on improving small business financing options by connecting investors (i.e. lenders) with a choice of loans in a digital market place. Much like an eBay for small business loans or a match making market. P2P Business Lending is about using technology to make what was once unviable, viable. This article looks at emerging innovators ThinCats and True Pillars as a source of funding for small businesses and enhanced income for professionally managed SMSFs. Technology Makes Small Loans Affordable Small business […]
DomaCom partners with peer-to-peer lender
DomaCom has announced it will partner with a peer-to-peer lending company to extend opportunities for advisers in the property sector. DomaCom chief executive Arthur Naoumidis said DomaCom’s partnership with ThinCats Australia will allow advisers to be on both sides of property transactions by creating leveraged book builds. “This also provides the 350 lenders on the ThinCats platform the opportunity to gain exposure to property assets and the ability to lend funds at an attractive interest rate with a lower risk profile,” Mr Naoumidis said. ThinCats Australia, which has been operating in Australia for the past 18 months, is a peer-to-peer lending platform for secured business loans to small and medium […]
