mega banks — Fintech and DeFi Research Archive

Posts in mega banks

What Goldman's institutional financial cloud on Amazon means for embedded finance

In this analysis, we focus on Goldman Sachs launching an institutional embedded finance offering within Amazon Web Services, and Thought Machine raising a unicorn round for its cloud core banking platform. We explore these developments by focusing on the emerging role of cloud providers as distributors of third party software, think through some of the implications on standalone fintechs and open banking, and check in on AI company Kensho. Last, we highlight the difference between Web3 and Web3 approaches to “cloud”, and suggest a path as to how those can be rationalized in the future.

Digitizing banks with better BNPL, Underwriting, and Anti-Fraud Tech, with Amount CEO Adam Hughes

In this conversation, we chat with Adam Hughes – the Chief Executive Officer at Amount, a technology company focused on accelerating the world’s transition to digital financial services via its digital retail banking platform, world-class digital authentication & fraud prevention tools, and ecommerce point-of-sale financing technology.

More specifically, we touch on digital lending industry Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL), as well as the trends of working with large banks and enabling their digital transformation to access some of these themes as part of embedded finance and banking-as-a-service.

digital lending, digital transformation, mega banks, neobank, paytech, embedded financeLex SokolinNovember 19, 2021Amount, Avant, Enova

The Law of Unintended Consequences via Wells Fargo, Divergence Ventures, DeFi designs, and the Federal Reserve

We focus on the law of unintended consequences, and how making rules often creates the opposite outcome from the desired results. The analysis starts with the Cobra effect, and then extends to a discussion of the Wells Fargo account scandal, dYdX trading farming, Divergence Ventures executing Sybil attacks, and Federal Reserve insider trading. We touch on the concepts of credit underwriting and token economies, and leave the reader with a question about rules vs. principles.

microeconomics, crypto, mega banks, Fractals & reflexivity, exchanges / cap mkts, decentralized financeLex SokolinOctober 13, 2021Wells Fargo, dYdX, Divergence Ventures, Sybil Attack, Federal Reserve, SoFi, MoneyLion, Compound

OnlyFans bank-forced adult content ban, its failure, and the Metaphysics of Finance

We talk about OnlyFans, and how its bank vendors pressured it to try to ban adult content, and how and why that failed. We also discuss the crypto tax provisions in the Senate version of the $1 trillion infrastructure bill, and their impracticality. These themes are tied together with a metaphysical hypothesis about the role of financial services, anchored in a discussion of the Platonic model of the mind. How are rationality, emotion, and social context involved to define the shape of our industry?

mega banks, decentralized finance, civilization and politics, philosophy, paytech, regulation & complianceLex SokolinAugust 30, 2021OnlyFans, Patreon, JP Morgan, BNY Mellon, Elizabeth Warren, Senate, Plato, Freud

Treasury Prime CEO Chris Dean on Banking-as-a-service, embedded finance, and the evolution of FinTech API infrastructure

In this conversation, we chat with Chris Dean, who is the Founder & CEO at Treasury Prime. Previously, Chris was the CTO & VP of Engineering at Standard Treasury, which was acquired by Silicon Valley Bank for an undisclosed amount.

More specifically, we discuss all things banking-as-a-service, FinTech APIs, embedded finance, and the general evolution of the FinTech banking industry over the last decade.

open banking / PSD2, embedded finance, paytech, mega banks, digital transformationLex SokolinAugust 13, 2021Treasury Prime, Standard Treasury, Silicon Valley Bank, BBVA, Simple Bank, ACH, Zibo, Mudflap

Step CEO CJ MacDonald on building the leading Gen-Z bank, TikTok influencers, and money culture

In this conversation, we delve deep into next generation finance and banking with CJ MacDonald, the Founder and CEO of Step – an incredibly successful neobank on a mission to improve the financial future of the next generation.

More specifically, we discuss traditional vs. digital banking, how personal experiences influence entrepreneurial the spirit, immersive market research, banking-as-a-service, the importance of financial literacy amongst Millenials and Gen-Z, the power of influencers who actually believe in a brand, aspirational brands vs. plastic Wells Fargo stage coaches, and lastly the proliferation of crypto in the minds of the next generation.

neobank, social & community, marketing, generational change, mega banks, digital transformationLex SokolinJuly 30, 2021Millennials, Gen Z, TikTok, Step, Gyft, Evolve Bank & Trust, Visa, Stripe

Understanding the Fintech user growth behind the $10.4 billion eToro SPAC and coming Chime IPO vs. the melting Megabanks

This week, we look at:

Chime, eToro, and Wise targeting the public markets through IPO and SPACs, and their operating performance
The overall growth in fintech mobile apps, their install rates and market penetration (from 2.5 to 3.5 per person), and whether that growth is sustainable
The implications for incumbents from this competition, and in particular the impact on money in motion vs. money at rest
Broader financial product penetration and an anchoring in how the technology industry was able to get more attention that we had to give

IPO / SPAC, digital investing, mega banks, neobank, digital transformation, macroeconomics, monetization / commercialLex SokolinMarch 22, 2021eToro, Chime, Wise / TransferWise

What 1840s "Free Banking" and the 1910s Cubist movement suggests about DeFi and economic machine evolution

This week, we look at:

The nature of innovation hubs, and how close groups of actors within a particular environment can be massively, fundamentally productive. Take for example the 30 million years of the Cambrian explosion.
The difficulty of experimenting with banking and money frameworks, the limits of traditional econometrics, and an overview of “free banking” in the 1840s.
How evolutionary theory can help us think about selection of economic models, and the hyper-competition and hyper-mutation that we see in crypto. DeFi protocols, like BadgerDAO and ArcX among hundreds of others, are experiments in designing different monetary policies and banking regime experiments in real time.

We have never before had such acceleration in the design space of the economic machine, subject to evolutionary pressures, built by a closely-wound nexus of developers. It is a fortune for the curious.

mega banks, central bank / CBDC, digital transformation, generational change, narrative zeitgeist, visual art, philosophyLex SokolinJanuary 25, 2021BadgerDAO, ArcX, Picasso

Google has come to Banking. What does that mean, and what should we do about it?

Google has done it. In a massive update to Google Pay, the company highlighted exactly the direction of travel for high tech, fintech, and the global banks. It has articulated a vision for competing with Apple Pay and Ant Financial. Let's walk through the features.

big tech, digital investing, digital lending, mega banks, digital transformation, super app, roboadvisor, paytech, open banking / PSD2Lex SokolinNovember 23, 2020Google, Citi, Square, PayPal, Mint.com, Yodlee, Trim, Cleo, Plum, Acorns, Wealthfront

Fintech Price War -- Goldman's $1.3B Marcus burn, Neobank £200MM loss, ETrade's $75MM trading fees

We are like the hungry at the all-you-can-eat buffet. In the beginning, there is not enough! Let's democratize access to food; to music; to transportation; to healthcare; to finance; to payments; to banking; to lending; to investing. The billions in institutional capital across universities, pensions, and sovereigns are delegated to smart portfolio managers. The day before yesterday, it was allocated by small cap stock pickers (hi Warren!). Yesterday, it was the alternative managers of hedge funds and private equity. Today, it is the trading machine and the venture capitalist. Tomorrow, it is the cryptographic artificial intelligence.

roboadvisor, neobank, digital transformation, mega banksLex SokolinOctober 7, 2019Goldman Sachs, Marcus, Atom, Monzo, Revolut, Starling, Tandem, Betterment, ARK Invest, Robinhood, JP Morgan, Schwab, eTrade, Interactive Brokers

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