The Financial Services Club's Blog

The Finanser's Week: 30th January - 5th February 2012

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

What the Facebook IPO means for banks

I haven’t written much about social media lately. The reason is that it’s now mainstream and dull. When you're scanning future views, you’re not as bothered about Facebook and Twitter when everyone’s familiar with and using such services. Facebook's pervasiveness...

Is SEPA happening and does it matter?

 
We had our annual debate at the Financial Services Club this week, with a classical Oxford style debate about whether SEPA, the Single Euro Payments Area, matters or not. This year, with the backdrop of the Eurozone implosion, the debate was far livelier than usual ...

 

This bonus rage is just envy

 
It’s bonus season and, as in previous years*, the media and politicians stir up a row over rick pickings and knighthoods.  Some say there’s even a “whiff of the lynch mob” in the air.  Certainly in the UK it’s getting ridiculous as this week we saw the hysterical media coverage over Stephen Hester getting a million pound bonus for steering Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) through this crisis, immediately followed by the Queen stripping Fred Goodwin, the former RBS CEO, of his knighthood.

 

Tell your CIO to get a new job (fast)

 
Just had an interesting banter about the future of technology with a technologist.  We like to think that technology is special.  It is.  In the words of Arthur C Clarke: “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”, and he’s right.   But do we really need armies of people to ...

 

Bitcoin: immersive or subversive?

I’ve written a few bits about Bitcoin but it still confuses folks, as was clear from the debate we had about it at the Financial Services Club the other night.  Donald Norman, co-founder of the Bitcoin Consultancy, presented the latest state of play in the currency, and it led to one of the liveliest Q&A sessions.  Let’s start with the basics ...


The major general news stories of the week include ...

Hackers fool bank security system - BBC
Criminal hackers have found ways around new security devices used for online banking, the BBC has learned.

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'Dead' trader found working in Las Vegas casino fined $90,000 - The Telegraph
A former Chicago commodities trader who disappeared in 1979 in murky circumstances and was found last year working in a Las Vegas casino was fined nearly $90,000 on Tuesday but was spared jail time for fraud, authorities said.

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Backlash fear as Sir Victor Blank pressed over knighthood - The Telegraph
The head of the civil service has been asked to strip former Lloyds chairman Sir Victor Blank of his knighthood, as concerns grow about a rising "anti-business hysteria".

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Criticism over Goodwin 'hysteria' - BBC
Figures from the business world hit out at a decision to strip former Royal Bank of Scotland boss Fred Goodwin of his knighthood.

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London Mayor says 'bonjour' to banks fleeing French tax - The Telegraph
Britain should welcome with "open arms" French banks that want to move business from Paris to London to escape France's new financial transaction tax, according to the Mayor of London and Britain's top bank lobbyist.

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How do countries run their state banks? - BBC
How do other countries run their state banks?

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FSA chief Hector Sants says sorry for RBS failure - The Telegraph
Hector Sants, chief executive of the Financial Services Authority, has apologised for the failure of Royal Bank of Scotland on his watch and said he would not let any of the lender's former managers work in finance again.

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Three are sent to prison for defrauding Swiss bank of $22m - The Independent
Three conspirators, including the former owner of the no-win, no-fee firm Claims Direct and an ex-partner at the top-drawer law firm Mischon de Reya, have been jailed for defrauding a Swiss bank.

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Realities dawn on City bankers - Financial Times
Professionals in work want to stay put but those seeking jobs are looking at options they would not have considered previously

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RBS to pay investment bankers £1.5bn settlement - The Telegraph
Royal Bank of Scotland, the lender at the centre of a storm over its chief executive's bonus, is to pay out as much as £1.5bn to City bankers as it counts the cost of its disastrous foray into investment banking.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

   

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 23rd January - 29th January 2012

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

How to deal with an insolvent bank

Sitting in a conference talking about living wills isn’t how you want to spend your typical day, but it did spark a whole bunch of thoughts in my mind. The FSA issued their consultative paper 11/16 last summer. The idea...

The future of capitalism

 
It’s Davos time, as usual. In the last week of January, the great and the good of the world’s leadership from governments, business, academia and media all gather in Switzerland to debate the future of the world’s economies and the...

 

Casino capitalism: only for those who can afford the chips

 
For some time there’s been debate about whether Vickers or Volcker is the right way to go. Should investment banks be divided from their retailing and commercial siblings by a fence, or completely separated so that one cannot poison the...

 

Wipe out market makers = best execution

 
Yesterday I wrote about the concept of banks being barred from betting on the bonds and equities markets. “Own account” trading disappears and the only folks who can “speculate” are those with their own chips to play in the game:...

 

Who the hell needs biometrics in banking? 

 
Biometrics isn’t discussed that much at banking conferences these days. Most of the time, when I raise the topic, there’s a groan from the banking audience. “Oh, been there, done that.” The usual view is that biometrics doesn’t work. It’s...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Angela Merkel in 'Tobin tax' jibe at Britain - The Telegraph
Angela Merkel said that the failure to fully endorse the financial transaction tax was one of the key areas where European efforts to stem the crisis were "insufficient."

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Europe Unprepared for Greek Default, Rogoff Says - Business Week
Kenneth Rogoff, an economist at Harvard University, talks about the European debt crisis and the impact of a Greek default on the region

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FSA fulfils vow to bag high-profile target - Financial Times
The watchdog has been promising a high-profile scalp to prove to those in the City that it will not tolerate trading on privileged information. Now it has delivered

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HSBC faces money laundering inquiry - The Telegraph
HSBC executives face the prospect of being called to appear before a US congressional hearing this year as part of a Senate investigation into allegations the bank was involved in money-laundering.

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Funnyman Barnier wins over City audience. Not - The Telegraph
Who'd have thought it? Michel Barnier, European Commissioner for markets and services, solicited cheers from a City of London audience yesterday morning.

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Fred Goodwin and the Occupy crowd should take up Scouting - The Telegraph
Uniformed youth groups play a vital role but are short of leaders. Boris Johnson suggests some people who could help out...

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Lagarde warns of '1930s moment' - BBC
IMF chief Christine Lagarde warns the world faces an economic spiral reminiscent of the 1930s unless decisive action is taken on the eurozone crisis.

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Italian and Spanish banks see billions withdrawn - The Telegraph
Italian and Spanish banks suffered the largest outflows of depositors' money last year as customer fears over the safety of money held at Southern European lenders escalated.

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Virgin Money nears deal on MBNA portfolio - The Telegraph
Virgin Money is in pole position to buy a key part of MBNA's UK and Irish credit card business after a joint approach by Goldman Sachs and Apollo Management for the whole business appeared to have fallen by the wayside.

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Vision of buyside clearing fails to become reality - Financial Times
Many clients of the banks are still not ready for the ’big bang’ of central clearing

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

 

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

 

The Finanser's Week: 16th January - 22nd January 2012

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

Amartya Sen: thoughts on poverty and the global financial crisis

I attended an interesting lecture last night from an economic legend: Professor Amartya Sen of Harvard University. If you haven’t heard of him, he’s known as the Mother Teresa of economics in his native India, and has spent a lifetime...

How to create a banking strategy

Following on from my discussions of solutions versus product people and vertical alignment versus horizontal, the question came up as to how to think strategically. How can you really get inside the customer’s head? What keeps the CEO awake at...

How will the world look post-crisis?

I’ve been debating some future presentations with various folks today, and a little ray of light went off in my head. The light was triggered by a comment: “can you talk about what impact regulatory change may have on bank...

The euro will go on, and on, and on ...

Over the weekend, Standard & Poor’s downgraded nine Eurzone countries, calling into question the viability of the Eurozone for the long term. France was downgraded to a level not seen since 1975. Italy is now considered the same credit risk...

Consumers will pay for better online banking

PwC conducted research with almost 3,000 banking customers from a range of segments across markets to discover their expectations of banking in the digital age. They selected both emerging and developing markets including China, India, Mexico and the UAE, as...

Eurocrash! The Musical

One of the good friends of the Financial Services Club is David Shirreff, European Business Correspondent for the Economist.   David and his compatriots Russell Sarre (music) and Ross Livingstone (direction) have come up with another timely piece of fun: Eurocrash! The Musical.

The major general news stories of the week include ...  

MPs push for Sir Fred Goodwin to lose knighthood - The Telegraph
Sir Fred Goodwin, the controversial former chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland, is to come under further pressure over his knighthood.

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MPs round on Mervyn King for 'disrespect' over Bank proposals - The Telegraph
Sir Mervyn King has been accused of being "disrespectful" by MPs, with members of the Treasury Select Committee complaining he gave them too little time to consider proposals for a new oversight body.

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RBS attracts bidders for investment bank, raising hopes for jobs - The Telegraph
EXCLUSIVE: Royal Bank of Scotland has received initial offers for all the investment banking businesses it is attempting to sell, raising hopes that many of the staff facing redundancy may be taken on by the buyers.

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Barclays chief won't heed pleas for restraint on pay - The Telegraph
Vince Cable has personally warned Bob Diamond, the chief executive of Barclays, that banking executives must show restraint in next month's bonus round.

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The world according to Goldman Sachs - The Telegraph
Ahead of the Davos summit, Goldman Sachs president Gary Cohn talks to The Sunday Telegraph about the outlook for Europe, the US economy and whether 2012 holds any rays of hope.

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A Look at PayPal's 4Q2011 Financial Results - Payments News

PayPal's parent eBay announced financial results for 4Q2011. PayPal ended the quarter with 106.3 million active registered accounts, a 13% increase year over year. On average, PayPal added a million new accounts every month in 2011. PayPal revenue for the quarter increased 28% year over year driven primarily by continued

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Survey Says More than Half of Retailers Testing In-Store Tablets in 2012 - Payments News
In its latest custom research report, RIS News looks at retailers’ incredible interest in tablets and finds that "While only 6% of respondents report that tablets are fully deployed in their stores today, another 28% are currently testing tablets in stores and an additional 31% plan to begin testing in

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UK bond trade put at risk by new US financial regulation - The Telegraph
New rules designed to stop banks playing fast and loose with their customers' money could have the knock-on effect of hobbling the market in UK government debt, investors and traders have warned.

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Black Friday for euro crisis - The Independent
The eurozone lurched further into chaos as France was downgraded by a top credit rating agency and talks on a crucial deal to restructure Greece's unsustainable public debt burden broke down.

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Central bank independence at risk from financial crisis, warns UBS - The Telegraph
The potential for losses from the banking system to wipe out all or much of the capital of central banks could see the end of independence for monetary authorities, according to UBS.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the Complete Banker Series

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

    

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 9th January - 15th January 2012

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

Horizontal versus vertical: myth and reality

For most of my life, I’ve been aligned to the financial services industry as a supplier of technology and, throughout this time, I’ve dealt with technology companies that struggle with moving from being horizontal to vertical, from generic to specific, from platform to solution.

Launch of the Clearing & Settlement Working Group (CAS-WG)

The Financial Services Club is launching a Clearing & Settlement Working Group (CAS-WG), in partnership with the Realization Group, with first sponsor BT. The Clearing & Settlement Working Group: Terms of Reference The aim of the CAS-WG is to debate...

2012: a bank customer outlook

Some folks asked me to add a fourth outlook to my 2012 series regarding what customer focused trends would be occuring in 2012. Now I'm a fintech guy with a strong marketing background, and was going to write a long...

2012: McKinsey say banks need to reinvent themselves 

Stumbled across an interesting report from McKinsey that says business as usual is not an option for American banks.  They'll go out of business if they don't change their business models, as average Return on Equity will sink from 11% to 7% by 2015, whilst the cost of equity will reach 9%. 

Save the City

There’s an interesting economist out this week with a front page saying: “Save the City”, which seems to be getting everyone a little bit worked up. Why? Because it’s in defence of the City. The story talks about the history...

Visions of the future ... 1960s style

During the last holiday, I found another interesting set of predictions from 1962 in a book by Arnold B Barach called 1975: And The Changes To Come. These predictions were looking out to 1975, thirteen years ahead, and included a few interesting ones that have come true including ...

The major general news stories of the week include ... 

RBS Cuts 4,800 Jobs as It Jettisons Units - Business Week
Royal Bank of Scotland is to cut about 4,800 jobs as it jettisons unprofitable units, citing volatile markets and the cost of new U.K. regulation

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RBS executive to receive £4m bonus - The Telegraph
An RBS executive is in line for a £4m bonus despite the lender's share price falling more than 40pc since July, creating a politically awkward situation for David Cameron who has promised to give shareholders the power to stop top staff being rewarded for failure.

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Barclays to axe over 400 jobs - The Independent
The finance sector suffered a fresh jobs blow today when Barclays announced plans to axe over 400 posts under "essential changes" to its technology and infrastructure division.

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Lloyds boss Antonio Horta-Osorio returns after absence - The Independent
Lloyds Banking Group boss Antonio Horta-Osorio was back at his desk today after a leave of absence due to serious sleeping problems.

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Sir Richard Branson's Virgin brand is the only hope for Northern Rock bank - The Telegraph
Richard Branson's brand, Virgin celebrates its acquisition of Northern Rock today.

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Bank signs up for cloud computing - BBC
Spanish bank BBVA tells the BBC it is switching its 110,000 staff to use Google's cloud-computing software in the largest deal of its kind.

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Exchanges in fear of eurozone transaction tax - Financial Times
Market infrastructures are becoming concerned that they are being sucked in as political footballs in a highly charged game of tax collection

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A wife's toxic dollar deal that could bring down top Swiss banker Philipp Hildebrand - The Telegraph
Ill-judged currency bet could topple one of Switzerland's top bankers.

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UK banks left vulnerable by Bank of England and politicians - The Telegraph
City analysts have criticised the Bank of England's handling of the Britain's banking sector and warned that Bank and Government policies have left major lenders vulnerable if the eurozone debt crisis spreads to the UK.

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David Cameron: I will veto financial transaction tax - The Telegraph
Prime Minister David Cameron has said for the first time he would veto a European-wide financial transaction tax unless it was imposed globally, deepening a confrontation with France and Germany.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

   

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 19th December 2011 – 8th January 2012

"Show me the money!" Sure, I'll show you your losses

You can sense an audience’s reaction as you present ideas on innovation. Sometimes its warm and engaging, sometimes distant and thoughtful, and occasionally remote and cynical. I experienced all three reactions last week when presenting at a bank’s annual ...

How The City Developed, Part Ten: The Victorians

The Victorian years saw a period of massive expansion, both in terms of Empire consolidation and industrialisation as the railway revolution led to revolutions in much more.  People could now travel between cities, moving goods and services rapidly by steam train to ports and across continents. The industrialisation of the world had its origins in Britain …

How The City Developed, Part Eleven: World Wars

By the late 1800s, London had become the financial centre of the world thanks to the expansionist colonisation of the 1700s and industrialist consolidation of the Victorians. The City of London now had strong links to rapidly expanding bank markets...

How The City Developed, Part Twelve: After World War II

Britain came out of the Second World War a weaker nation. The economy was in ruins, as was much of Europe’s economies, and it owed $3.5 billion to the USA as a result of a loan in 1946 which was...

How The City Developed, Part Thirteen: The Big Bang     

By the 1970s, the City had re-established its position of prominence thanks to trading in Eurocurrency and the increasing volume of trading in securities, but it lagged behind the rest of the world, particularly New York, due to its very traditional way of operating.  The markets were based upon a structure that was 150 years old,

How The City Developed, Part Fourteen: Crisis

Once the City had been deregulated in 1986, things really started to move.  Trading became more focused, frenetic and competitive, and markets moved millions and then trillions in minutes, instead of the old ways which were days or months. London was now rocking,

Season's greetings and all that ...

For the past month, my inbox has been clogged up with Joyeux Noël’s and Feliz Navidad’s and various other festive fodder. Personally, a nice handwritten card works best for me, but the ecard is now becoming the standard so here's my favourites of 2011.

The Top Ten Finanser Posts of 2011

Here are the Top 10 blog posts of the year. It gives a pretty good idea of what's hot in banking 2011 I think ... Happy New Year, and lots more on banking in 2012 from next Tuesday.

Happy New Year - dates for the 2012 diary

Here's a quick update on our confirmed events calendar for the Financial Services Club London in 2012, with full details for every meeting at the end of this blog entry. Register for any of the Financial Services Club meetings listed and get discounts on top events like Finovate ...

2012: an economic outlook

2012 is here and we all hope it’s better than 2011. Sure, some of you may have had a very good last year, but most thought it pretty dire with job losses, austerity measures, civil uprisings, protests, a second financial...

2012: a banking outlook

Yesterday, we talked about the economic outlook for 2012. What about the banking outlook? Well it’s also challenging, with five clear things happening: Regulatory change will still be high on the agenda Investment banking will get a radical overhaul Clearing...

2012: a bank technology outlook

What’s hot in tech in 2012 is a continuation of what’s hot in tech in 2011: cloud, smartphones, tablet PCs, contactless mobile and more. Rather than just repeating all that again, let’s be more specific: Contactless mobile will reach a... 

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

 

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Top Ten Finanser Posts of 2011

Here are the Top 10 blog posts of the year.  It gives a pretty good idea of what's hot in banking 2011 I think ... Happy New Year, and lots more on banking in 2012 from next Tuesday.

The Top 20 Banks of the World, 2011: China hits the Big Time

I’ve enjoyed the Banker’s Top 1000 listings for a long time now and, when last year’s listings came out, looked back over the last twenty years to see how things had changed. This year’s list has now just been published...

Cloud Computing in Banking, the Big Debate

Gartner estimate cloud computing will grow from a market worth $36 billion in 2009 to over $160 billion by 2015, with around a fifth of all firms relying on the cloud for significant parts of their technology operations by 2012....

Six key technology developments for banks in 2011

Looking at technology specifically in financial services, there are many that are being cited as hot for 2011: the creation of new retail payments structures, as Apple and Google get into mobile payment wallets and PayPal and Facebook push credits to the extreme; the maturing usage of internet and mobile television, as ...

HSBC stumble with Secure Key 

HSBC have just hit the headlines as they’ve launched an additional layer of internet security, in th form of a calculator terminal called ‘secure key’. The calculator is small enough to attach to a key fob, and generates a random ...

Is Sir Fred Goodwin's personal life in the public interest?

It's hot news right now that Sir Fred Goodwin, the former CEO of the Royal Bank of Scotland, has filed a super-injunction to stop details coming out about his personal life in the press.  The issue now is that everyone wants the super-injunction removed, with MPs threatening to make public and leak to the press anyway. What could be so personal?

Now it's an eyePhone

Talking about iris recognition and passwords recently, I got a note from Spanish Bank, Bankinter, which has just launched an app that identifies clients through iris recognition on the phone. The way it works is that customers access their brokerage...

Why banks should worry about Google, Apple, Facebook ...

I've talked for a while about: money being meaningless, as data is now key; the battle over information, and how information warfare is the new game; the fact that banks should move from being safekeepers of money to being safekeepers of data ... all of this leads to a conclusion that those who are good with data will win.  And who's good with data?  Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, etc.  What does that mean for banks?

Banking in 2020

I’ve been asked recently to think about banking in 2020. That’s ten years away and, if we cast our memories back ten years, it’s quite a leap. Ten years ago, we had lots of themes bubbling away including customer-centricity, technological...

Mobile banking and PFM is so last decade

Another conference focused upon financial innovation today, and all the talk is about mobile stuff, Google Wallets, mobile stuff, Banksimple, mobile stuff and Movenbank. I’m regularly stressing today that we must:: stop talking about mobile; and talk about the point-of-life....

Are payments infrastructures fit for purpose?

During the spring, we reached out and asked readers to provide their views about the world's largest payments infrastructures and whether they are fit for the purpose they are being used for.  Today, we released the results ....

 

The Finanser's Week: 12th December - 18th December 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

How The City Developed, Part Five: The Stuarts

After the Tudors, England went through a period of massive turmoil under the new Royal Household of the Stuarts.  Throughout the 17^th Century, the Royal Household (the Crown) and Government (Parliament) were at war, both figuratively and literally.

How The City Developed, Part Six: The Bank of England

Following the disaster of Charles II’s spending under the Stuarts, the newly reformed operations were stabilised under the new monarch, King William III. Realising that his purse was haemorrhaging and that he couldn’t do the same as Charles, as in...

How The City Developed, Part Seven: Lloyd's of London

Alongside the founding of the Bank of England, the making of London as the City of Finance can be traced to two other key developments that occurred at the same time: the opening of an insurance centre and a stock...

How The City Developed, Part Eight: the London Stock Exchange

As mentioned, three core financial service businesses began at the same time at the end of the seventeenth century: the Bank of England in 1694; Lloyd’s Coffee House in 1688; and the London Stock Exchange in 1698. The Stock Exchange...

How The City Developed, Part Nine: The 1700s

By the early 1700s, London had established the basic mechanisms of modern finance – acentral bank with the ability to stabilise monetary policy; a stock exchange to enable financing of industry and commerce; and an insurance marketplace to cover risks in business.

Banker commits murder and gets away with it

A year ago, the FSA issued a short 298-word statement saying that after an extensive 17 month investigation into the collapse of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), no action would be taken against Sir Fred Goodwin or others. There...

The major general news stories of the week include ... 

Survey Says Banks Plan to Expand in Mobile, but Remain Split on NFC - Payments News
Fiserv announced the results of a survey of the mobile banking and payment plans of top-tier financial institutions. The in-depth survey, conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Fiserv in September 2011, evaluated the plans of 10 banks and credit unions that in total hold more than one-third of all

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Top economists reveal their graphs of 2011 - BBC
Economists reveal graphs that had biggest impact on them this year

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Eurozone banking system on the edge of collapse - The Telegraph
The eurozone banking system is on the edge of collapse as major lenders begin to run out of the assets they need to keep vital funding lines open.

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Sarkozy: Now clearly two Europes - BBC
French President Nicolas Sarkozy says there are now clearly two Europes following last week's summit in which the UK vetoed EU treaty changes.

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Is the City worse off after veto? - BBC
Has Cameron's veto helped the City?

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Germany's Hidden Risk - Business Week
The Bundesbank has quietly lent half a trillion euros to the European Central Bank. Could that determine the fate of the euro?

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Panic fuels Latvian run on bank - BBC
More than 10,000 Latvians withdraw deposits from Swedish-owned Swedbank after rumours the firm is in financial difficulty.

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Watchdog's verdict could put Sir Fred Goodwin in the dock - The Telegraph
Sir Fred Goodwin could finally face criminal charges after the regulator's report into the collapse of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has suggested that the bank's directors broke Britain's accountancy laws.

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RBS investigation: who's who - The Telegraph
Here is a detailed list of all those metioned in our in-depth investigation into the collapse of RBS, from the bank, its adivers, the government to rival bidders for ABN Amro.

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Lloyds chief executive Horta-Osorio to return to work as bank sells 632 branches to Co-op - The Telegraph
Antonio Horta-Osorio will return to the helm of Lloyds next month after making a "full recovery" from extreme fatigue the bank said as it announced the sale of 632 branches to the Co-Op.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

    

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

 

 

The Finanser's Week: 5th December - 11th December 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

How The City Developed, Part One: The Romans

In Roman Times, the centre of London was at Cornhill, where the Bank of England is based, and Leadenhall market, where Lloyd’s of London is based.  At Leadenhall, the Romans built a Basilica, a combination of a town hall and law court …

How The City Developed, Part Two: The Vikings

Following on from yesterday’s post about the Romans building London, they left in 410 A.D. and the City went to rack and ruin over the following centuries as the buildings were left untended. Then, in the ninth century, the Vikings...

How The City Developed, Part Three: Medieval Times

The first proper bridge in London was built in 1176 and completed in 1209. There had been other bridges built by the Romans and Vikings, but these were always of wood and generally got burnt and pulled down. The bridge...

How The City Developed, Part Four: The Tudors

We finished Part Three of our History of the City with a nod to Sir Thomas Gresham, Banker to Queen Elizabeth I and forefather of all things in the City of London today. Thomas was the son of Sir Richard...

UK banks pay £53.4 billion in taxes

Just got a press release that I would usually ignore ... but this one's interesting. It's from Open Europe, a think tank, and say that the City not only pays over £50 billion in taxes but is in danger of being squashed by the EU ...

The London Protest #OccupyLSX is useless

I’ve been down to the #OccupyLSX, or #OLSX for short, site several times. That’s the Occupy London Stock Exchange site for those not following them on twitter. They were inspired by the #OccupyWallStreet, or #OWS folks, who began protesting back...

 
The major general news stories of the week include ... 

Top ten banker jokes - The Telegraph
Bankers don't have much to smile about but Lloyds Banking Group has managed to have a giggle - the taxpayer-owned bank is running staff training at the Comedy School. To share the joke, here are the top ten wise-cracks about bankers:

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Europe's banks have £1.5 trillion of toxic assets - The Telegraph
Europe's banks must dispose of a pool of toxic assets larger than the entire British economy if they are to return to profitability and meet new capital rules.

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City in derivatives depository boost - The Telegraph
London has become home to the world's first trade repository for the £356 trillion interest rate derivatives market in a major boost for the city's place as one of the world's major financial centres.

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Lloyds Banking Group laughs all the way to the bank - The Telegraph
Heard the one about a taxpayer-backed bank taking leadership lessons from The Comedy School? Nope, we hadn't either. But at Lloyds Banking Group, it seems, managers have been having a laugh.

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Bank of France debts jump tenfold on capital flight - The Telegraph
The Bank of France faces surging debts to Germany's Bundesbank and fellow central banks in the EMU system as foreign investors pull large sums out of French accounts.

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Citigroup plans to cut 4,500 jobs - BBC
US banking giant, Citigroup, says it is to cut 4,500 jobs around the world in an effort to reduce its costs.

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Exodus: Movement of rich people - BBC
Why high-fliers increasingly live and work abroad

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Billionaire behind Northern Rock - BBC
The billionaire behind the Virgin buyout of Northern Rock

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This week could be the last chance to save not just the eurozone but all of Europe - The Independent
Tomorrow a week begins that could propel the eurozone towards fiscal unity, change Britain's relationship with its euro partners, and offer a potential route out of the debt crisis and renewed credit crunch which now accompanies it.

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'Dismissed' partner accuses Ernst & Young of corruption - The Telegraph
Accountant Ernst & Young is facing an allegation of corruption at one of its global headquarters as part of a whistleblowing case brought by one of its ex-managing partners..

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 28th November - 4th December 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

As my SEPA gently weeps ...

I hosted a dinner last night with a focus upon developments with SEPA and innovation. What innovations has SEPA introduced? Long silence. To be honest, there are some – the ability to cash concentrate direct debits into the most efficient...

Four dimensions of innovation

Another aspect of innovation discussed this week was slightly out of the negative SEPA box and more on the positive future box. We were talking about all the things that were innovative – NFC, mobile, anything Chinese, Google, etc –...

Taking a wallet onto a mobile doesn't work

I discovered a fascinating report from Mobey Forum this morning. It was released this week, and says that “providing consumers with the convenience and functionality of mobile wallet technology will not be sufficient to drive mass-market adoption”. Mobey Forum –...

Product or solution: a breed apart

Just had an interesting chat with a couple of guys who provide sales development and account planning services to IT firms. The gist of their business is turning product sellers into solution sellers, a core stomping ground of mine and...

Banking is a land of extremes

There are evangelists and dogmatics across the banking spectrum. On the one hand, I have regular debates with mobile extremists who believe cash is dead; on the other, there are those who are still fighting to keep the cheque in...

The major general news stories of the week include ... 

Germany remains oblivious to apocalyptic warnings - The Telegraph

Extraordinarily serious and threathening...perilous - these are not the sort of words a central banker normally uses, yet every time the Governor of the Bank of England, Sir Mervyn King, appears in public these days, he ramps up the language of crisis still further.

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Fed saves Europe's banks as ECB stands pat - The Telegraph
Stripped to essentials, America is once again having to rescue Europe from itself.

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Europe’s Single Currency May Unravel Before Action, UBS Says - Business Week
Europe’s monetary union may unravel sooner than the region’s leaders can mobilize to ensure the sovereign-debt crisis doesn’t overwhelm the currency, a UBS AG foreign exchange strategist wrote.

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Can Britain cope if the eurozone collapses? - The Telegraph
As the unthinkable looms, ministers are starting to prepare for the worst, reveals Iain Martin.

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Free banking is a 'myth', says UK's top bank regulator - The Telegraph
Free banking in the UK is a myth and customers should be charged higher fees for basic bank services, according to Britain's top banking regulator.

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S&P reduces bank credit ratings - BBC
Ratings agency Standard & Poor's downgrades the long-term credit grades of a string of major banks including Barclays and HSBC.

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Autumn Statement 2011: HSBC and Standard Chartered hit hardest by bank levy increase - The Telegraph
HSBC and Standard Chartered are likely to be hardest hit by the Government's decision to increase the bank levy for the third time in less than a year.

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UK watchdog suggests PwC fine of up to £34m - Financial Times
Regulator says the penalty for the auditing failures should not be 'vastly disproportionate' to the £33.3m fine imposed on JPMorgan last year

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Quinn ordered to repay €1.7bn to Anglo Irish Bank - Financial Times
Largest judgment made against an individual by an Irish court

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Middle-Aged Bankers Face Heart Disease Risk - Business Week
About half the middle-aged staff tested at Banco Santander show signs of early-stage disease of the arteries that could cause heart attacks or strokes

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

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The Finanser's Week: 21st November - 27th November 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

Should a bank be called a bank

After Richard Branson's Virgin Money successfully acquired Northern Rock, loads has been written about the takeover. Much has been negative, saying that the Chancellor did a bad deal and ‘gifting’ the bank to Virgin, losing £400 million in the process....

Risk is not a discipline, it's an attitude

One of the panels at the trading technologies show that I chaired was all about pre- and post- trade risk, and the impact of real-time risk management. We were meant to talk about real-time risk, what it would mean, the...

FPGA – the next trading revolution?

This week is a trading technology week, chairing panels at two trading technology events. The first is focused upon trading architectures and I’m surrounded by engineers. Forget strategists, technologists, programmers or developers. Engineers. The reason is that it’s all about...

The future competitive battleground for banks

I blog a lot about the disruptions of new technologies on bank structures, but only in the last few weeks had the chance to reflect upon what this means overall to a bank’s strategy. A bank is a digital business,...

Reasons to reject the euro

There’s still lots of debate about the euro and Eurozone, with Greece imploding and now Italy et al all going up the Furka Pass, so to speak. Now I’ve been purposefully avoiding getting into the fray, until now  ...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Lloyds Considers Two Bids for U.K. Branches - Business Week
Lloyds Banking Group Plc said it will “take forward” discussions from two bidders for the 632 branches it is selling to comply with European Union state-aid rules.

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RBS chief Stephen Hester says 'casino' banking unit could be sold - The Telegraph
Stephen Hester, chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland, has conceded for the first time that the state-backed lender could sell its investment banking division.

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Insight: Fidelity's expensive debt raises eyebrows - Reuters
BOSTON (Reuters) - Fidelity Investments gives a select group of employees an unusual perk. It lets them make unsecured loans to the company at annual interest rates that have paid them nearly 20 percent in recent years.

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UK at greatest risk of financial crisis since Lehman Brothers collapse - The Telegraph
Britain is more at risk of a major financial crisis than it was in the months before the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the country's banks, insurers and hedge funds believe.

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Debt crisis sweeps towards heart of Europe - Reuters
BRUSSELS/MADRID (Reuters) - The euro zone's debt crisis swept closer to the heart of Europe despite a clear-cut election victory in Spain for conservatives committed to austerity, adding to pressure on the European Central Bank to act more decisively.

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Lloyds announces leadership plan - BBC
Lloyds announces contingency plans in case chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio extends his stress-related sick leave.

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Critics of credit default swaps have got it wrong - Financial Times
Critics of the product have misunderstood the fundamental difference between CDS and insurance

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Risk expert Nathan Bostock decides to steer clear of the riderless Black Horse - The Telegraph
Nathan Bostock knows a thing or two about risk and restructuring. Or at least you hope he does, given he's head of both at Royal Bank of Scotland, a fine practitioner of the two Rs, if ever.

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Virgin Money sees no loss to taxpayer from N Rock deal - The Telegraph
The Government will not make a loss on Northern Rock, despite the gap between Virgin Money's £747m takeover and the £1.4bn the taxpayer has invested in the bank, Virgin Money chief Jayne-Anne Gadhia has insisted.

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George Osborne reveals Northern Rock sale forced on him by secret Labour agreement with Brussels - The Telegraph
George Osborne has defended the timing of the Government's sale of Northern Rock, claiming his hand was forced by a secret agreement Labour made with Brussels when the lender was nationalised in 2008.

 

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The Finanser's Week: 14th November - 20th November 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

The Bible says bankers' bonuses are OK ...

I was listening to a sermon yesterday. The sermon quoted a lengthy section of the Gospel according to Matthew, where three servants are given their master’s wealth to look after whilst he is on travels. Two of the servants increase...

Get Shorty! Andrew Haldane speech

Last night was the occasion of the Sir John Gresham annual lecture. This year it was held at the Four Seasons Hotel in Canary Wharf with the keynote speaker being Andrew Haldane, Executive Director for Financial Stability with the Bank of England ...

Long versus Short is like Good versus Evil

I was honoured to be the guest speaker for the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists at their Quarterly Lunch yesterday. The speech focused upon short selling versus long finance, and here's the script of the speech including two of the best jokes about finance ever told ... 

The Future of Business

Links to a speech given on 18th November 2011 on the Future of Business, based upon the impact of the Information Revolution.  Video and slideware accessible here to watch in Silverlight; or here for general media access.

A Hugh MacLeod, Gaping Void special

At this year's SIBOS, the cartoonist Hugh MacLeod appeared etching and sketching. Hugh is a humourous guy who runs the website Gaping Void that gets over two million unique visitors monthly. I was lucky enough to have Hugh produce a special one-off work for the Finanser ...

Innovation in Banking and ... books?

As mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I took place in an interesting webinar recently with James Gardner, author of "Innovation and the Future Proof Bank";  Gijsbert Koren, author of "Crowdfunding - The New Investing"; and Rhydian Lewis, CEO of RateSetter.   The focus was around innovation and P2P financial markets, and the webinar has now been posted online for all to see.

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Apocalypse now? - The nightmare scenario for the eurozone - The Independent
It is late 2012. Somewhere in the troubled eurozone periphery, perhaps Greece or Italy, a technocratic government collapses after imposing unprecedented levels of austerity for 12 months.

Merkel ally's warning to Cameron - The Independent
Senior German politicians last night rounded on David Cameron, criticising his approach to the eurozone crisis and warning they would not allow the UK to "get away" with its refusal to back a European financial transactions tax.

Europe plans curbs on credit rating agencies - The Telegraph
The European Commission will today unveil "proposals for legislation" that could radically change regulation of credit ratings agencies.

Reforms will cost an extra £13bn a year, analysts say - The Independent
Britain's clampdown on its banks will cost them an extra £13bn a year, more than doubling the cost of implementing new regulatory rules, Goldman Sachs analysts said yesterday.

Lloyds shareholders demand update on lack of a leader - The Telegraph
Investors are demanding an update on the growing leadership vacuum at Lloyds Banking Group as a result of the continued absence of chief executive, Antonio Horta-Osorio.

'No excuse at all' for owning HSBC shares - The Telegraph
Investors have "no excuse" for owning the shares of HSBC and would be better off owning no bank shares at all, according to a leading City analyst.

UniCredit to axe over 6,000 jobs following €10.6bn loss - The Telegraph
Unicredit, Italy's second-largest bank, is to cut more than 6,000 jobs after reporting a €10.6bn (£9.1bn) loss for the third quarter.

Visa Digital Wallet To Be Named "V.me" - Payments News
Visa has told AllThingsD that it will use V.me as the go-to-market brand for its new Visa Digital Wallet. The company had said earlier that the online wallet would have its own acceptance mark that differentiates the new multi-card brand wallet from the traditional Visa acceptance mark. In a related

Fresh UBS rogue trading revelations - Financial Times
The Swiss bank suffered unauthorised trading on the desk of its UK wealth management division in 2007, a UK tribunal has heard

Buffett buys $10.7bn stake in IBM - BBC
Warren Buffett, one of the world's most successful investors, reveals he has built a 5.4% stake in IBM after years of avoiding tech stocks.

 

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The Finanser's Week: 7th November - 13th November 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...  

That European Joke (Part Two)

I’ve been loathe to talk too much lately about the Eurozone as it’s just too darned depressing. What with Greece slipping and sliding away, Italy bunga’d out and now France being challenged, it’s just a crazy, crazy moment in history....

A big know know

I’m no expert on such matters, but a friend of mine was talking about different tools for different times and how they use certain technologies for different services. In particular their interests are data visualisation techniques and how these can...

Seeing the wood for the tree branches (again)

We had a discussion last night about branchless banking, with two retail bank leaders telling me I was wrong about the idea. The argument was not actually about the concept of branchless banking, but less branch banking. Even so, these...

The High Priests of Banking

Talking about the St Paul’s protesters yesterday, you do wonder if they maybe have a good point or two to make. Like their American counterparts, I’m sure they do but unfortunately it’s all a bit loose and airy-fairy, with a...

Jim O'Neill on the BRICs - the next decade

Just tweeted to our friends in the #OccupyLSE group – that’s Occupy the London Stock Exchange (LSE) for those who are not aware of the protest outside the LSE at St Paul’s – that I attended a meeting at the...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Britain prepares for eurozone 'armageddon' - The Independent
Deep in the Treasury’s recently-refurbished offices, the Government’s finest economic brains are having to think the unthinkable.

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UK banks face huge losses on Italian debt - The Telegraph
British banks could be among the hardest hit by the Eurozone financial crisis because they are exposed to tens of billions of pounds of Italian debt.

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David Cameron set to veto 'unacceptable' RBS bonuses - The Telegraph
David Cameron has indicated he will block "unacceptable" bonuses that Royal Bank of Scotland is set to pay bankers this Christmas.

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Crunching the numbers on HSBC job losses - The Telegraph
Bi-monthly satirical magazine Private Eye runs a regular feature titled 'Number Crunching' where it contrasts a set of figures to illustrate a bigger point.

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Nordic Banks Beat European Rivals - Business Week
Nordic banks, which steered clear of the subprime meltdown and the worst of Europe’s debt crisis, are proving that it pays to keep business local as they outperform bigger rivals and increase their corporate lending.

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Is culture important in banking? - The Telegraph
Does it really matter if anyone at a bank actually likes the people at the top running the business? Should we care if senior executives hold a barely disguised contempt for those that are charged with determining the strategy they are then required to implement?

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Tobin Tax is a tax on pensioners that will cost 1m jobs, says Chancellor George Osborne - The Telegraph
George Osborne has condemned plans for a European Union levy on financial transactions as a 'big tax on pensioners' that will lead to 995,000 job losses and not cost bankers a penny.

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I've seen the future for Royal Bank of Scotland and it's called NatWest - The Telegraph
A month ago I asked: "Will someone please explain the point of the Royal Bank of Scotland?"

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EU: we'll make UK cut bank bonuses - The Independent
The European Commission is considering tough new proposals to curb the pay and bonuses that banks can hand out to staff working across the European Union.

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British banks facing claims risk in Saudi fraud case - The Telegraph
HSBC and Standard Chartered could be dragged into a multi-billion dollar dispute between warring Saudi factions after the banks were forced to hand over potentially incriminating documents.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

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For details of sponsorship email us.

The Finanser's Week: 31st October - 6th November 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...  

PayPal, Forrester, Deloitte & First Data research on mobile payments

A summary of research on mobile banking and payments conducted in the USA by Deloitte; the UK by PayPal and Forrester; and globally by First Data.

The Pope, EU and USA want a Tobin Tax ... surely it'll happen? 

There’s been this thing called a Tobin Tax mooted for a while now. Before we get into the whole thing, what is the Tobin Tax? “A Tobin tax, suggested by Nobel Laureate economist James Tobin, was originally defined as a...

Life at the speed of a snail ... 

Another lengthy chat about the speed, or lack of speed, in banking innovations. Right now we’re seeing this massive change in the end user devices for payments and access, with every mobile telephone on the planet becoming a contactless point...

We need the iPod of payments 

I felt vaguely irritated today when an analyst from a major research firm was asked to position why NFC contactless payments haven’t taken off. He said they had analysed the worldwide global market for mobile payments, the demographics of takeup,...

Something far more frightening than Zombie Bankers

It’s 31st October and you know what that means? Halloween. Ghouls, ghosts and ghoulies abound. And yes, you find plenty of them in the financial system. First, there’s those fiendish Zombie Bankers: These are so popular, there’s even a movie…

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Greeks' worst fear is run on banks - Financial Times

Concern about Greek lenders are spreading beyond the country, say Greeks whose credit cards, issued in Athens, are being rejected abroad

What is a Tobin Tax? - BBC

Dr Rowan Williams backs it, but what exactly is a Tobin tax?

Lloyds chief executive António Horta-Osório takes break to recover from fatigue - The Telegraph

The turnaround of Lloyds bank has been thrown into turmoil after António Horta-Osório, the state-backed lender's chief executive, was forced to take a leave of absence due to 'extreme fatigue' after only months in the job.

Who is that on my banknote? - BBC

The historical portraits that appear on our banknotes

RBS chief executive Stephen Hester claims bankers' bonuses are 'not the font of all evils' - The Telegraph

Stephen Hester, the chief executive of state-backed lender Royal Bank of Scotland, has reignited the row over bankers' bonuses, saying they were 'not the font of all evils'.

Banks' focus on equity return harms financial system, warns Financial Policy Committee's Robert Jenkins - The Telegraph

Banks' focus on measuring their performance in terms of return on equity has wrought the financial system, according to a senior former banker now sitting on the Bank of England's new Financial Policy Committee.

Barclays chief Bob Diamond is banking on a quick return to huge profits - The Telegraph

Pink Floyd can be a bit of a yawn. But they did come up with a little ditty about the chief executive of Barclays Bank - Shine On You Crazy Diamond.

Barclays' profits blasted as 'tricks' by City analysts - The Telegraph

City analysts turned on Barclays, accusing it of attempting to present an overly positive picture of its third-quarter performance.

Sarkozy says...Banks must end big payouts - The Independent

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has told French banks they must stop paying big bonuses and dividends.

Technology is key to keeping to new rules - Financial Times

Managing data well is central to the ability to comply with new regulations.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

   

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The Finanser's Week: 24th October - 30th October 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ... 

The best mobile financial videos on the Web

During the conference yesterday, several presenters used video clips to illustrate the range of mobile payments options there are today. One of the longest and most comprehensive is a reworking of Microsoft’s Retail Banking Vision, which originally focused upon branch...

Australian Bank launches mobile innovation

Whilst Bendigo Bank in Australia is worried about Google and PayPal, Commonwealth Bank responded this morning by launching the first really innovative mobile app for payments that I've seen since BBVA's Strands.

Mobile banking and PFM is so last decade

Another conference focused upon financial innovation today, and all the talk is about mobile stuff, Google Wallets, mobile stuff, Banksimple, mobile stuff and Movenbank. I’m regularly stressing today that we must:: stop talking about mobile; and talk about the point-of-life....

10% of lending via P2P?

In 2008, Gartner Group predicted that 10% of the consumer lending market would be provided through Peer2Peer (P2P) lending by 2010.  It was a bold prediction but imagined change would happen faster than it has in reality.  However, in reality, the impact of P2P lending is far greater as today's numbers show ...

Is Bitcoin the future of money, or are we smoking dope?

Bitcoin is a digital currency designed to be controlled through encryption rather than a centralised authority. Operating in exactly the same way as cash, Bitcoins are fully exchangeable as an anonymous form of currency in real-time across the internet and, shortly, at Point-of-Sale.  Could such a system replace cash entirely in the future?

The Financial Services Club London Agenda, Winter 2011/12

We are often asked about the Financial Services Club's future agenda.  It's always available on our website, but here are details as they stand right now.  Some dates and speakers are still being confirmed (marked with '*'), but these are all going to happen over the next six months or so ...

The Future of UK Regulation (FSA Speech)

Margaret Cole, Interim Managing Director, Conduct Business Unit at the Financial Services Authority (FSA), gave a great speech at the Financial Services Club last week.  Margaret's Conduct Business Unit will become the Financial Conduct Authority in 2013, when the Financial Services Authority splits into two units. Everyone is interested to know what this means …

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Santander faces £13bn capital shortfall - The Telegraph
Spanish banking group Santander said it faces a capital shortfall of close to €15bn, according to the European Banking Authority.

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How roast turbot helped eurozone leaders swallow their pride on debt - The Independent
Shortly after 4am, looking exhausted but still impeccably dressed, Nicolas Sarkozy pushed through the closed doors of the European Council meeting room in Brussels to brief the media.

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Madoff couple 'attempted suicide' - BBC
The wife of jailed US financial swindler Bernard Madoff admits to CBS that the couple attempted suicide after his $65bn fraud scheme was exposed.

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Danish Banking Crisis Entices Buyers - Business Week
Denmark’s banking crisis has left in its wake a number of cheap acquisition targets that may entice buyers to take advantage of an industry brought to its knees by a sequence of insolvencies.

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With Wikileaks Embargo, Payment Institutions Choose The Devil They Don’t Know - Techcrunch
You may agree with Wikileaks' mission. Or you may think they're a menace. Or perhaps something in between. But here's one thing you can't deny: they're an organization, with a leader, a name, and (however well hidden) servers, bank accounts, and so on. They also have principles — which, again,

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Loyalty shown to supermarkets and banks - The Independent
Customers are most loyal to banks and building societies, supermarkets and mobile phone companies, according to the latest Ipsos Mori and the Logic Group poll.

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New euro 'empire' plot by Brussels - The Telegraph
European Union chiefs are drawing up plans for a single "Treasury" to oversee tax and spending across the 17 eurozone nations.

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FSA 'can't cope' with living wills - The Independent
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) will not be able to handle an influx of "living wills" next year, according to the British Bankers' Association (BBA).

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Sarkozy tells Cameron to 'shut up' in euro clash - The Independent
David Cameron was given a vicious dressing down by French President, Nicholas Sarkozy, yesterday as tensions reached boiling point among European leaders arguing over how to save the euro.

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Lloyds expected to float branches as sale hopes weaken - The Telegraph
The return made by the British taxpayer on its investment in Lloyds Banking Group 

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

 

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 17th October - 23rd October 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ... 

Inside the bank's boardroom crisis meeting, October 2011

Welcome to the first of what may be many fly-on-the-wall (FOTW) reports of internal bank management matters. In this first FOTW report, we sent Marty, our Scottish fly, into the monthly management meeting of one of the world’s largest banks,...

40% of City workers to lose their jobs 

 
I’ve recently been thinking about headcount cuts. It’s always hard … And it's getting harder. For example, I wrote in August that thousands of bank jobs were being cut, adding up to an expectation of 15,000 City jobs this year....

 

Banking as components or integrators 

 
Just spent the day in a payments conference focused upon operational excellence. We talked about Basel III, SEPA, the PSD, Mobile … the usual stuff, but there was a particularly intriguing presentation from Olivier Denecker of McKinsey in the...

Who needs to focus on the customer?

Thinking more about componentised versus integrator banks leads to an interesting dialogue that started way back for me. Fifteen years ago, we were grappling with bank models and structures and talked a lot about whether banks could be integrated retailers,...

  

Art for art's sake 

 
Banks have great treasures behind their marble veneers, as demonstrated by their art collections. UBS own around 40,000 art objects, including works by artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol, and JP Morgan Chase is known for having a... 

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Eurozone crisis could cause collapse of global banking system, warns Citigroup's Willem Buiter - The Telegraph
The world banking system could collapse if eurozone leaders fail to curb the region's sovereign debt crisis, according to Citigroup's chief economist Willem Buiter.

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Euro rescue plan will not be enough and anti-capitalism protests will grow - The Telegraph
Roger Bootle: Inflation will peak soon, but support for the anti-capitalism protests likely to grow

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Vickers calls for overhaul of retail banking boards - The Independent
Sir John Vickers yesterday warned that ring-fenced retail banks' boards would require a complete overhaul to meet the demands of his banking reforms.

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'I don't think they appreciate what the City contributes' - The Independent
Financial workers returned to their offices in the City of London yesterday to find the hardcore remnants of a global anti-capitalist movement camped on their doorstep.

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Google Wallet Now Lets You SingleTap That App - Techcrunch
Google Wallet continues on its slow (but exciting) march toward letting you pay for things simply by tapping your phone against a special, NFC-enabled credit card reader. Today, in a post on Google's Official Blog, the wallet team announced that it's rolling out support for SingleTap — a new feature that lets

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VIDEO: Fred Goodwin says sorry for RBS - BBC
Sir Fred Goodwin apologises to RBS shareholders after the bank collapsed in 2008 and was bailed out by the government.

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Barclays looks to bid for Spanish cajas - The Telegraph
Barclays is trying to bolster its position in Spain's high street banking market by eyeing a number of the country's cajas.

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Europe's lost decade as $7 trillion loan crunch looms - The Telegraph
Europe's banks face a $7 trillion lending contraction to bring their balance sheets in line with the US and Japan, threatening to trap the region in a credit crunch and chronic depression for a decade.

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Are Facebook ID Cards In Our Future? - Techcrunch
Facebook has  filed for a trademark on the usage of the word "Facebook" on business cards and, more curiously, "non-magnetically encoded" ID cards among other things. If granted the trademark would protect using the word Facebook in the specified formats, not any actual invention. So what if Facebook just wants

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RBS 'to overhaul investment arm' - The Independent
Taxpayer-backed Royal Bank of Scotland is reportedly preparing an overhaul of its investment banking arm which could put up to 5,000 jobs at risk.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

    

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 10th October - 16th October 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ... 

Do banks know their customer?

So I’ve just finished a mainstream keynote debate at #Eurofinance2011 in Rome about bank to corporate relationships. My role was to moderate a panel of six key industry players, three from corporations: Debbie Millar: Group Executive - Treasury, Funding and...

Virtual currencies will be the next wave of change

At #Eurofinance2011, I chaired another panel on innovations in payment channels.  My opening piece talked about mobile channels and a lot about virtual currencies, including Facebook Credits, Ven Currency and Bitcoin.  The mobile stuff garnered lots of nods and acceptance; the latter on virtual currencies seemed to cause more bewilderment and confusion.  I am used to such looks.

Trading before the trader

I chaired TradeTech Architecture last week, and the conversation was all about HFT and low latency. For those not in the know, that’s High Frequency Trading, using a technology called low latency that enables ultra-high speed trading in real-time. What’s...

HFT is still early days

As mentioned, I was chairing a conference on trading technologies and one technologist told me that, in theory, it would be technically possible to send an order around the world in 400 milliseconds or less today. Most people disagree with...

60% of the world's order executions are on mainframes

I was just reading through my notes as Chair of the #TradeTech conference last week, and found a bunch of interesting notes and quotes. Rather than assembling them into a sensible blog post, I’m just going to write them up...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

High-street banks attacked over account switching policy - The Independent
The Independent Commission on Banking (ICB) is under attack for failing to push for portable bank accounts – a basic reform that campaigners say would free consumers to switch banks and increase the efficiency of the wider economy.

Bank chiefs question ringfencing - BBC
The UK's biggest banks question the value of ringfencing their retail operations, but say it is "not a make or break issue".

Volcker Rule gives US regulators a headache - The Telegraph
As the Occupy Wall Street protesters marched towards Central Park to make their case outside the homes of New York's wealthiest on Tuesday, the chief executives of Wall Street banks probably felt like holding a demonstration of their own.

Trichet Throws Away Script, Reminds U.S. Euro Built to Last - Business Week
“The overall picture when you look at the euro area as a whole is very, very different from the perception,” Trichet told the conference organized by the Bretton Woods Committee.

Full report should throw light on to failings at RBS - The Telegraph
Early drafts of a report into the failure of Royal Bank of Scotland have begun circulating among a small group of officials ahead of the document's publication expected later this year or early next.

Co-op suffers debit card glitch - BBC
Some customers of the Co-operative Bank have had difficulties paying with their debit cards following a weekend upgrade of the system.

Goldman Sachs 'escaped paying £20m National Insurance bill in HMRC deal' - The Telegraph
Goldman Sachs escaped paying up to £20m on a disputed National Insurance bill for bankers' bonuses, according to leaked Government documents.

The £127m 'fraud' never revealed by Société Générale - The Telegraph
French bank Société Générale was the victim of a Sfr182m (£127m) "fraud" that has never been revealed to shareholders.

Square Processing $2B In Payments Per Year, Has Signed Up 800K Merchants - Techcrunch
Disruptive mobile payments company Square is making a number of announcements today relating to growth and new user features. First, the company is dropping its new user limits. For background, Square offers an iPhone, Android and  iPad app which allows merchants to process and manage credit card transactions with a

Software group Misys rocked by shareholder revolt over pay - The Independent
Misys insists it will stick to its executive pay plan despite an extraordinary shareholder revolt at the software group's recent annual general meeting.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

For details of sponsorship email us.

 

The Finanser's Week: 3rd October - 9th October 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ... 

Volcker Rule details are leaked

The Volcker Rule, named after former head of the Federal Reserve Paul Volcker who advised on the investment banking reforms of the Dodd-Frank legislation, has been rumoured for ages and was originally a proposal to ban proprietary trading completely.

In case you missed it, Google Wallet now available

I got an email last week saying that Google Wallet had launched.  Strange ... I thought it launched last May, but no this is not the launch. This is take-off.

NAB’s latest ad campaign – getting nasty? 

Originally NAB came up with a brilliant campaign to differentiate themselves from the other mainstream banks in Australia with a campaign called “The Breakup”. I really liked it, but they haven’t really followed it through as their next campaign was good, but completely unrelated to The Breakup. 

Proof that the branch (of old) is dead 

The Finanser’s mate Brett King – Chris Skinner “taught me everything I know” - was in a webinar yesterday, talking about the future of banking with some good stats to back up ideas. A key one is that the average number of in-branch transactions has declined by a quarter in the last four years ...

American Excess rather than Express 

So I can’t find my American Express Card. Looked everywhere and it’s lost. Darnit. I Google “AMEX lost corporate card”, and find an American telephone number. Harumph. So I Google “AMEX lost corporate card UK”, and find the UK 01273...

Just a brick in the Wall ... Street 

Obviously, many of you will be aware of the Occupy Wall Street protest by now. If you’re not, it may be that you were at #SIBOS when it all started, so here’s the low down. My friend who lives on...

Don't punish the rich with taxation ... incentivise them 

It’s a Sunday morning and I’m asked to contribute to a debate on the BBC’s Sunday Morning Live (using awful Skype webcam) about whether the rich should feel a moral obligation to pay more tax.* My take on this is...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...

Apple 'visionary' Steve Jobs dies - BBC
Technology pioneer and co-founder of Apple, Steve Jobs, dies at the age of 56 with President Obama saying "the world has lost a visionary".

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UBS failed to act on rogue trading evidence before losing £1.5bn - The Telegraph
UBS has admitted it detected evidence of unauthorised trading but did nothing to investigate it before last month's revelation it had lost $2.3bn (£1.5bn) as a result of a rogue trader.

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French bank fears rejected by Morgan Stanley - The Independent
Executives at at Morgan Stanley were last night cheering thesuccess of their efforts to restore confidence in the investment bank, after a bear raid on the company's share price and bond insurance that had threatened to spark anall-out panic.

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UK wins major victory to stop EU regulation of financial services - The Telegraph
Britain has won a major victory in a battle to stop heavy-handed EU regulation of financial services but faces a longer struggle to stop German and eurozone discrimination against the City of London.

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Q&A with JPMorgan's technology team - Financial Times
How the investment bank handled duplicative technology

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'Mood darkens' in finance sector - BBC
Financial services firms are expected to cut jobs in the next three months after recent volatility on the stock markets, a report says.

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European politicians plot to block UK veto on 'Tobin tax' - The Telegraph
A group of European politicians is plotting to impose the financial transaction tax (FTT) in a way that Britain would be powerless to veto, a British MEP has warned.

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Lloyds could be forced to hang on to Verde until the markets improve - The Telegraph
When Antonio Horta-Osorio proclaimed in the Spring that he hoped to identify a final solution for the 632 branches he is being forced to sell by European regulators by the end of the year, the Lloyds Banking Group chief executive could not have predicted what was about to happen.

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HSBC retail bank should go to Paris, says Myners - The Telegraph
Lord Myners, the former City minister, has publicly suggested HSBC should move its UK retail banking operations to France in a bid to avoid the potential repercussions of the Independent Commission on Banking's final ring-fence recommendations.

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PayPal On Barriers To Google Wallet: Mass Adoption Of NFC Is Years Away - Techcrunch
As you may have read, Google officially launched its mobile payments platform Google Wallet recently, which allows you to pay for products in the real world by tapping your NFC-enabled Android phone against a compatible card reader. Shortly following the initial announcement of the technology in May, payments giant PayPal

 

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The Finanser's Week: 26th September - 2nd October 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

Eurozone crisis threatens SEPA

The euro zone crisis threatens to derail the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA), according to a new research paper. Challenging those who separate the crisis from SEPA preparations, The Eurozone, the ECB and the feasibility of SEPA: an overview, says the Sepa policy objectives were based on certain assumptions about how the single market and the euro would be operating by the time SEPA was realised, but these have not occurred.

My latest prezi on the Bank of Tomorrow

For those who are interested, here's my latest presentation from a recent visit to Germany ... you can skip the first minute as the presentation is being loaded ... Here's the Prezi that goes with it for those who like... 

Toronto's hero banker: from riches to rags 

So I finish my time in Toronto with a little relaxation and sightseeing. Won’t bore you with all the details, but one of the most interesting places to visit is a place called Casa Loma.  This is a house, or castle, build be a banker who built Canada and who was then ruined by the government ...

The #1 Woman in Finance, Europe 

I was sent a list from the American Banker this week, who have just published their annual list of the most powerful women in banking. Number 1 is Karen Peetz, Vice Chairman of BNY Mellon Generates roughly half of BNY...

Banks are awful, says the FSA 

Email received 08:47, 29/09/2011: Dear Mr. Skinner I have to say that your blog reflects the UK: a nation of bloody whingers. This was well demonstrated by the release of the FSA’s figures this week that shows all your citizens...

Compare and contrast the UK and the Philippines 

It's always interesting to compare and contrast financial markets and issues, and this was easily illustrated yesterday when I received a nudge of two videos. The first is from the UK and talks about debt; the second is from the Philippines showing how mobile payments are assisting a food crisis ...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...  

The trader who lifted the lid on what the City really thinks - The Independent

The world may be teetering again on the precipice of economic disaster but those with any investment in the popularity of Alessio Rastani, a hitherto unknown "independent trader", had a worse day than most after his memorable appearance on television yesterday morning.

Trader was not a hoaxer, says BBC - BBC
A financial trader who appeared on the BBC was not a hoaxer, the broadcaster says after doubt was cast on his credentials.

BBC financial expert Alessio Rastani: 'I'm an attention seeker not a trader' - The Telegraph
Is self-styled City trader Alessio Rastani a professional hoaxer?

Santander's warning shows just how fragile the UK banking sector is - The Telegraph
Ana Botin set out the Santander story on Thursday and her tale made grim reading, particularly for those investing in new banking ventures.

Barclays loses head of European retail banking - Financial Times
Deanna Oppenheimer's departure means the division's responsibility falls back to Antony Jenkins, global head of retail and business banking

NBNK bids £1.5bn for Lloyds branches despite cost of credit - The Telegraph
...but Lloyds Banking Group's attempt to drum up a competitive auction for its 632 branches has been dealt a blow by a sharp increase in the cost of the credit line it has pledged to provide bidders.

Deloitte sued for $7.6bn in US - BBC
Accounting giant Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu is sued for $7.6bn in the US and accused of failing to detect fraud, something Deloitte denies.

FSA staff jump ship as City regulator nears split - The Independent
The Financial Services Authority is losing an increasing number of employees as the City regulator moves closer to being broken up by the Government.

EU looking at banks' online payments organisation - The Independent
European competition regulators are investigating whether a group of banks, including HSBC, Barclays and Deutsche Bank, are blocking the entry of new players into Europe's online payments market, the system used by consumers to buy products online.

Quant trading: How mathematicians rule the markets - BBC
How mathematicians are taking over the markets

 

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The Finanser's #SIBOS Week: 18th September - 25th September 2011

For those who are that interested, here are all the blog entries made during the week at SIBOS in one place ...

 

SIBOS 2011 - what will be the big themes? 
We should be talking about risk.

And so SIBOS begins 
First impressions.

Brett King launches Movenbank at #sibos #innotribe 
Brett King, author of Bank 2.0, is launching a new bank based upon facebook and gaming,

Gartner and #innotribe get social 
The key tech themes of mobile, social, big data and cloud are consistent.

Citigroup's keynote at #Sibos ... nil points 
Sorry to my friends at Citi, but I was seriously underwhelmed by John Havens, COO for Citigroup's speech.

I said RMB, not Rumba 
Lots of opening thoughts seem to be focused upon China and the importance of the Remnimbi.

Banks wasting billions on inefficient clearing 
In today's keynote plenary, it's clear that banks are spending at least $20bn on clearing and settlement ... and wasting a large part of it.

Rogue traders and big data 
The innotribe stream discussed lots of things, but the link between rogue traders and big data made me wake up.

Operatic arias and sigh boats 
A summary of the day two evening, including awaking to find the eurozone is melting down!

Video: the Future of Money 
The innotribe team made a special video on the future of money ... here it is.

Banks should build their business models as APIs 
According to one speaker at the morning session on new economies, banks should just throw their functionality out to the community as APIs.

Growth will come through regulatory arbitrage 
The second plenary big debate was a corker, especially when all the banks admitted that they would have to look for regulatory arbitrage as it's in their shareholder's interests.

The #innotribe startup challenge final - here we go! 
200 companies applied for the innotribe startup challenge.  The two winners get $50,000 each.  Here's a review of the ten finalists.

SWIFT's strong commitment to innovation 
Lazaro Campos is clearly 100% committed to innovation with SWIFT.

The Future of Facebook 
The premiere of a video and an amazing statistic that facebook credits are processing $50 billion a year.

Banks must learn how to do regulation and innovation 
Banks seem to focus more on regulation than innovation.  They must learn to deal with both in equal order.

#innotribe drums drown out short-sighted journo 
The funniest moment of SIBOS 2011 as the drums are told to keep quiet.

And so SIBOS ends ... until next year 
A closing session with Brett King, the SWIFT leadership and Osaka beckons.

Reflections on SIBOS 2011 
This year's SIBOS had a certain smell to it ... do you know what it is?

 

Meanwhile, in the rest of the world, here are all the top news stories ...

UBS's biggest investor attacks bank's lapses - The Independent
UBS's biggest shareholder heaped pressure on the Swiss bank yesterday by criticising it publicly over the £1.5bn loss inflicted by an alleged rogue trader.

Misys pay plan is 'wholly excessive' - The Independent
Misys investors should vote against the software company's pay plan, which could reap its chief executive a payday worth more than 900 per cent of his salary, Pirc said yesterday.

The domino effect in Europe's debt crisis - BBC
Which country could fall to the next downgrade?

Lloyds curtain call lines up final bow for Win Bischoff - The Telegraph
Exactly three years on from Lloyds TSB's acquisition of HBOS, the final curtain has fallen on the deal's management team.

Lloyds finance director resigns - reaction - The Telegraph
Lloyds Banking Group, the 41pc taxpayer-owned lender, is look for a new finance director after Tim Tookey quit to join the insurer Friends Life. This is how the industry reacted to the news:

Vickers reforms force banking industry to face reality - Financial Times
The UBS scandal has been taken as a powerful endorsement of proposals for reforming the UK banks but, in truth, no such endorsement was needed

Banks must 'more than double profits' to meet capital requirements - The Telegraph
Banks across Europe and North America must more than double their profits by 2015 if they are to meet the capital requirements likely to be imposed on them over the next few years, experts have warned.

Non execs have 'little idea' on risk - The Independent
Many non-executive directors have little idea about the risks in their companies and are not sufficiently independent of management, according to a survey of internal auditors.

Google Wallet Likely Launching Tomorrow - Techcrunch
Last week, Google posted an awesome teaser video for Google Wallet featuring George Costanza. The implication: Google Wallet would finally be launching soon. Now we think we know when: tomorrow. As you can see in the above image, documentation is being sent around to partners stating a September 19 launch

String of fake UBS trades uncovered, says bank - Financial Times
Fuller picture emerges of how accused trader Kweku Adoboli trader could have allegedly racked up $2.3bn in losses.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

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The Finanser's Week: 12th September - 18th September 2011

Our biggest stories of the week are ...

PayPal's ubiquitous vision

A couple of interesting posts about PayPal this week. First, they presented their ideas about competing with Visa and MasterCard at physical points-of-sale. This was followed up by a blog post from PayPal President Scott Thompson, PayPal Unveils the Future of Shopping.

Why most banks' technology fails to meet the business needs 

Just enjoyed another great conference where one manager presented their IT strategy and operations. Amazingly the old nugget of the language of IT and business came up again, where she opined that IT doesn’t speak the language of business. She...

Not cashless but less cash 

I’ve been on travels lately and found myself seriously questioning cash. It began on the journey out to Iceland when I decided to get some cash from the AMEX office at Heathrow airport. First, the AMEX office wouldn’t take my...

Bickers over Vickers: the right stuff? 

So the Vickers Report has finally crept out into the wilderness. All 358 pages of it. Half of it talks about how to increase the competitiveness of banking and the other half about what to do if a bank fails...

The similarities between banks and landmines 

Last night I was presenting to the MAG-net group. MAG-net is the networking group in the City for the Mines Advisory Group, MAG, a charity supported by the Financial Services Club and others that clears areas of mines so that...

Results of the 2011 Survey on SEPA and the PSD 

Survey reveals that SEPA and the PSD are progressing but liquidity risk needs addressing Research finds liquidity risk is a major potential exposure for the future and calls for more automation The Financial Services Club and Logica revealed the results...

 

The major general news stories of the week include ...  

UBS rogue trader: statement to employees in full - The Telegraph
A 31-year old man has been arrested by the City of London police in connection with rogue trading that has cost Swiss banking giant UBS an estimated $2bn (£1.3bn). Here is UBS's emailed statement to its employees.

PayPal Unveils the Future of Shopping - PayPal Blog
Today, we gave merchants a sneak peak at PayPal’s new payment technologies that will help give their customers a much better shopping and buying experience through PayPal.

PayPal To Unveil New Payments Platform For Merchants, Will Include Location-Based Offers And More - Techcrunch
PayPal held an event today in Los Angeles for merchants to get a early look into the eBay owned payments giant's new technologies. As CEO Scott Thompson says in a blog post , PayPal is re-imagining money and making it work better for merchants and consumers – whatever device you’re

Could Greece be Europe's Lehman? - BBC
Could Greece push the world off a cliff again?

Barclays chief Bob Diamond 'welcomes' end of uncertainty with ICB bank report publication - The Telegraph
Bob Diamond, chief executive of Barclays, has become the first boss of a major British bank to comment on the Independent Commission on Banking's final report, saying he 'welcomed' the document.

IT glitch affects bank customers - BBC
Halifax and Bank of Scotland customers are unable to get full access to their accounts over the internet, after an IT system upgrade.

Independent Commission on Banking: main points - The Telegraph
The ICB published its final report on Monday, recommending that banks should protect their retail operations from riskier investment banking units and raise capital level to protect taxpayers from future crises. Here are the main points:

ICB hands Osborne 'take it or leave it' package of bank reforms - The Telegraph
Sir John Vickers will offer "a take it or leave it" package of reforms to George Osborne when the Independent Commission on Banking (ICB) delivers the most fundamental reshaping of the sector since the Big Bang.

Treasury loses five-year fight to conceal 40 names linked to collapsed bank BCCI - The Telegraph
The Treasury has lost its five-year fight to conceal the names of 40 individuals and companies linked to BCCI, the fraudulent international bank that collapsed two decades ago.

Bank of America restructuring puts 40,000 jobs at risk - The Telegraph
A radical cost-saving plan that will put up to 40,000 jobs at risk at Bank of America is expected to be announced next week.

 

If you like the Finanser, check out the books of the blog: the new Complete Banker Series

 

The Financial Services Club is sponsored by:

For details of sponsorship email us.