FinTech Futures: Top five stories of the week – 14 April 2023
Here’s our pick of five of the top news stories from the world of finance and tech this week.
FCA orders closure of WealthTek, joint special administrators appointed
The FCA has ordered WealthTek to cease operations
The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has ordered fintech firm WealthTek to cease all operations, citing “serious regulatory and operational issues”.
The regulator says it made an “urgent application” to the High Court after the unspecified concerns came to light and ordered WealthTek to shut down all its regulated activities on 4 April.
Following the FCA’s application, the UK’s High Court appointed Shane Crooks, Mark Shaw and Emma Sayers of BDO LLP as joint special administrators of WealthTek, which also trades under the names Vertem Asset Management and Malloch Melville.
Northumbria Police also arrested a man aged 48 in connection with the FCA’s concerns, who the regulator says it later interviewed “under caution”.
Visa announces Visa+ to support interoperability between P2P apps
Payments giant Visa has partnered with PayPal and Venmo to trial Visa+, a new way to send money via different person-to-person (P2P) digital payment apps.
PayPal and Venmo users in the US will be able to set up a payment address linked to their account and send money between the two platforms later this year.
Visa partners DailyPay, i2c, TabaPay and Western Union will also integrate Visa+ within their platforms.
TabaPay head of commercialisation Tim Astanov says the new solution for the fintech community will “remove friction and make instant money movement easier for our clients and their customers”.
BNP Paribas deploys Worldline solution to tackle SEPA direct debit fraud
BNP Paribas extends Worldline partnership
BNP Paribas has extended its partnership with paytech Worldline as the firm looks to tackle fraud in SEPA direct debit transactions.
SEPA direct debit (SDD) is an automated payment method that is used in the Single Euro Payments Area to pay one-off or recurring invoices through a signed mandate.
BNP Paribas Cash Management will deploy Worldline’s Account Validation solution within its white-label EasyCollect direct debit product to offer a “secure and low risk payment method” and an improved user experience for its customers.
Worldline’s offering combines the electronic signature of SEPA mandates with open banking-based account validation to “eliminate” the risk of IBAN misuse during the mandate signature process.
ClearBank sees income nearly triple to £58m in 2022
UK-based clearing and embedded banking platform ClearBank has announced it “nearly tripled” its income to £58 million in 2022 despite challenging macroeconomic conditions.
The strong results come after the firm announced it had achieved monthly profitability for the first time in Q4 last year.
In its latest annual report, ClearBank says the rise in income can be attributed to an increase in both net transaction fees (up by 43% year on year) and fixed platform fees (up by 23% year on year).
Its customer base rose by 22% and deposits grew to £3.7 billion, with a 20% increase seen in the week following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB).
Crypto API provider Wyre names Stephen Cheng as new CEO
Stephen Cheng, Wyre’s new CEO
US-based digital asset and payments infrastructure provider Wyre has appointed Stephen Cheng as its new CEO.
Cheng was named interim CEO for Wyre in January this year following a two-year stint as the firm’s chief risk and compliance officer. Prior to his arrival at Wyre, he was the chief compliance officer and BSA AML officer at Prime Trust.
He has also previously served as chief compliance officer and chair of the risk management committee at Green Dot Corporation and has held senior roles at First Data Corporation (now Fiserv) and American Express.
Pascal Levy-Garoua, independent director on Wyre’s board, says Cheng “performed exceptionally” on an interim basis by “turning around the company amidst a challenging economic environment”.
