Kieran Donoghue, the Irish Development Authority’s Global Head of Strategy, Public Policy and International Financial Services examines the continuing uncertainty around Brexit and role that Ireland can play as a strategic partner to the United Kingdom’s (UK) financial services industry.
Banks report to shareholders, but when it comes time to respond to shareholder concerns about their positive contributions to climate-change action, banks often fall short. Progress is slow but steady, thanks to activist shareholders’ efforts, to persuade banks to accept more responsibility for their financing of fossil-fuel ventures.
According to a report commissioned by the UK’s Treasury, Britain’s financial services system is experiencing an existential skills crisis. Why? As digital start-ups have moved quickly to offer desirable working benefits such as flexible hours or learning and development opportunities, financial institutions have been comparably slow to react to new workplace demands.
The current decade has not been kind to Greece’s financial sector, which has been beset by one crisis after another. And yet, from the rubble, a fully digital bank has arisen, the first in the country. In our interview, Praxia bank’s CEO Anastasia Sakellariou describes what it is like to create a bank with a vision to meet its customers’ needs solely through digital channels while remaining completely human.
Given the prevailing financial infrastructure that exists today, international transfers continue to remain costly, time-consuming and risky—and even more so when there is a need to exchange currency. Such transactions normally undergo a series of stages that invariably include the involvement of intermediary parties and the foreign-exchange market
Open Banking, which allows third parties to build applications around the activities of established banks, is curtailing the way banks have always functioned. The tried-and-true vertical-integration model, through which a bank maintains a firm grip on all of its operations, is being replaced by a more cooperative approach. How will innovative banks fulfill their roles as suppliers, producers and retailers of financial products and services in the Open Banking era?
Rarely has a technology been met with the excitement and trepidation that AI has. Because artificial intelligence not only matches but can surpass human intelligence, it is exciting as a means to improve speed, save cost and maximize accuracy—but menacing for its potential to displace human workers. Banks are embracing AI for its staggering benefits, while also acknowledging that it creates a few wrinkles that need ironing out.
Traditionally the banking sector has been shrouded in secrecy, guardians of not only customer financial data but their own internal information. In the aftermath of the 2007 financial crisis, stakeholders, customers and regulators have demanded more honesty from the industry.
On June 20, it was revealed that the former chief executive of Barclays, John Varley, and three of the bank’s former senior executives had been charged by the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO).
By John Manning, International Banker In early March, Ulster Bank announced that from October onwards, it will be closing nine…