More than £2.5 billion was spent in the UK using contactless cards in the first half of 2015 and this is likely to increase even more as the upper limit for contactless payments increases from £20 to £30 from today.
The UK payments industry and regulators should focus on four main priorities to ensure the country has a ‘world class’ payments framework, according to Payments UK.
Equifax, the consumer and business information specialist, has launched a new service providing real-time, integrated data on companies and the individuals who own and run them.
No one involved in the UK financial services industry could have failed to notice the recent increase in level of fines issued by the UK’s City Regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority. Mary Stevens, from risk and regulatory technology company Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, analyses what the fines mean for the industry.
UK digital-only bank Atom has chosen financial technology company IRESS to provide the basis for its mortgage platform. Atom received its licence in June and plans to launch later this year.
LCH. Clearnet is to begin offering clearing clearing services for Spanish securities executed on BATS Chi-X, Turquoise and Traiana from Monday 7 September 2015, subject to regulatory approval. The new service, which introduces interoperability for the market segment will operate under the existing Title V settlement framework until the revised dates have been published by Iberclear […]
MiFID II comes into effect in January 2017, which might seem a long way off, but you need to start preparations now if your institution is really going to benefit
The European Commission has adopted new rules that make it mandatory for certain OTC interest rate derivative contracts to be cleared through central counterparties.
Banks may need to revisit the way they handle data, in preparation of an upcoming agreement between the European Commission and the US authorities on data-sharing.
Swiss exchange group SIX and Swiss telecoms company Swisscom are planning to create a Switzerland-wide, universal mobile payment solution in collaboration with banks. The plan encompasses shopping as well as peer-to-peer payments.
So after the protracted and ongoing rollout of SEPA, along comes further EU regulation in the guise of the second phase of the Payment Services Directive (PSD2) with further challenges to banks impacting the provision of one of the core banking services – namely payments
Reports of the death of cash have dominated the 2015 news agenda. A variety of industry developments – from the launch of Apple Pay through to a Danish proposal to end the obligation of retailers to accept cash – work together to imply that paper notes and coins could soon lose relevance. All this is underpinned by apparently irrefutable stats from the Payments Council which reveal that cashless transactions have now overtaken the use of cash in the UK
Fintech association Innovate Finance has launched UK Fintech 2020, a manifesto that sets out goals for the UK to be a centre for financial services. These include calls for increased investment in fintech, efforts to attract more fintech firms and the creation of more jobs in the sector.
Samsung is set to launch its upcoming payments service Samsung Pay in Europe within months, following a deal with MasterCard which will see Samsung Pay rolled out across the region through MasterCard’s Digital Enablement Service.
A new venture plans to create a multi-asset, multi-currency institutional payment and settlements infrastructure based on blockchain technology. Called SETL, the venture is backed by Peter Randall, former chief executive at Chi-X, the multilateral trading facility that is now part of BATS, and Anthony Culligan, founder of peer-to-peer bitcoin trading site Roolo.
The Plato Partnership, a consortium of asset managers and broker-dealers working to build a non-profit equities trading utility in Europe, has chosen the London Stock Exchange’s Turquoise subsidiary as its preferred partner, and the two companies announced they are exploring a “commercial collaboration”.
More than a million people switched their current account to a rival bank in the year leading up to July 2015, according to new figures published by UK payments system Bacs. The numbers represent only a minimal increase on the year before – undermining hopes that making switching easier would lead to dramatic improvements in the competitiveness of UK retail banks.
Santander has launched a group money management app called KiTTI, which is a virtual ‘cash kitty’ that allows groups of people to create a collective pot of money using a mobile app and a prepaid contactless MasterCard.
Ten financial services startups have been chosen by startup accelerator Startupbootcamp FinTech to participate in its annual London program, which seeks to find the best new companies in financial services and bring them to market. Notable themes among the finalists include Bitcoin and the blockchain, big data, algorithms, cloud computing and social networking.
Nearly half of UK consumers say that faster payments are a factor in their choice of back account provider, with 45% saying that the offer of faster electronic payments would encourage them to switch their bank account provider.
Recent studies suggest that banks in the UK are rebuilding their reputation among consumers and investments in mobile and digital are at least in part responsible –though trust remains fragile and other studies highlight concerns over pricing and transparency. Customer satisfaction across all sectors in the UK has flat-lined over the past six months, but some that regularly attract scrutiny – including banking – have shown signs of improvement,
BNP Paribas has become a direct participant in CHAPS, the UK’s same day high-value electronic payment system, the 22nd bank to join in this role. More are expected to join by the end of 2016. As a direct participant, the bank can directly send and receive irrevocable, guaranteed sterling payments with same day finality, rather than through a third-party.
UK banks rank bottom in a nine-country survey of how well banks match up to customer expectations in terms of rewarding customer loyalty and helping them manage their finance. Overall, the UK banks rank third, behind the US and Germany.
The Payment Systems Regulator, the new economic regulator for UK payment systems, has appointed Ruth Evans as the chair of the Payments Strategy Forum. Evans is currently chair of The Authority for Television on Demand, the independent co-regulator for the editorial content of UK video on demand services.
Apple Pay has launched in the UK without the participation of HSBC and Barclays, two of the UK’s largest retail banks.
A new global innovation centre in Madrid promises to illuminate the uses of Big Data for banks and financial institutions. Built by EY (formerly Ernst & Young), the centre is part of a $500 million investment in analytics by the company.
Boat Services now supports the post trade publication of Russian OTC trading, by including stocks listed on the Moscow Exchange. The addition covers more than 300 Russian security instruments, including common and preferred stocks.
advances in technology, and particularly consumer demand, are driving change and making the payments environment an interesting place to be in the years ahead
More than 30% of all suspicious transaction reports in the European Union are triggered by the use of cash, according to Europol, with the €500 note – not widely used for payments – still in demand.
Over the last decade the financial markets industry has experienced significant regulatory upheaval. We have witnessed a new approach to supervising financial institutions, with regulators moving from a “light touch” approach to an “interventionist” one
The UK’s Payment Systems Regulator has published a series of papers describing its work on the creation of the Payments Strategy Forum, the body it is creating under independent leadership to bring together regulators, industry and users.
Visa Europe says that uptake of contactless payments in Europe continues to climb with more than one billion transactions made in the last year. Visa cardholders spent €1.6 billion in March 2015 alone – a three-fold increase over the same period in 2014.
Financial systems vendor Infosys is setting aside $10 million for Irish start-ups in the wake of being selected as a strategic partner by the Allied Irish Banks financial services group. Infosys will also set up a facility in Dublin to house up to 200 staff, including some transferring from AIB.
Western Union is to install self-service kiosks in 300 of UK retailer WH Smith’s stores later this year. The kiosks allow customers to enter the details of money transfer transactions and then use the retailer’s self-checkout to pay.
EBA Clearing has published a blueprint document spelling out high-level business requirements for the pan-European instant payment infrastructure it hopes to start piloting in 2017 following consultation with a task force composed of more than 20 representatives of EBA Clearing service users.
The funds industry has successfully implemented the requirements of the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive over the past year but has doubts about the use of data being gathered by regulators and question whether it is helping regulators to better spot threats and systemic risks that may impact market stability.
New payments options are springing up all over the place – except for the underlying infrastructure where current arrangement for access and governance may be a hinderance to innovation, according to the head of the UK’s Payment Systems Regulator.
The global financial crisis devastated the reputation of the UK banking industry and it is not hard to understand why public trust in banks is at a low ebb. Since 2008, there have been at least five major scandals involving one or more banks operating in the UK, writes Peter Duffy Along with the reputational damage […]
Talking used to be a positive thing. For many years, BT reminded us that it was “good to talk”; whilst in the 1980s the Midland Bank (since acquired by HSBC) promoted itself extensively as “the listening bank”. Now, there is a new breed of bank coming to the UK; one that doesn’t have branches or want a ‘physical’ interaction with its customers
Challenger UK retail bank Atom has received its licence from the Bank of England, meaning it will now be able to go ahead with plans to launch later this year. The bank will add competition to the UK retail banking sector, which until 2010 had not seen a single new entrant for 150 years.
