The world’s main repository for data on credit derivatives deals will move its database on to the blockchain, in the first big test case for whether the emerging technology can be employed across the finance industry. The DTCC, a US post-trade services group that processes more than $1,500tn of securities a year, will use technology from IBM and US blockchain start-ups R3 and Axoni as the basis […]
No one can ever confidently predict what will happen in the following 12 months, but forecasting 2017 is particularly difficult. The surprises of 2016 (Brexit and the election of Donald Trump are at the top of the list but there were others, including the sacking of the entire Kuwaiti parliament, Saudi Arabia’s backflip on its oil production policy and the sudden demonetisation in India) demonstrate that we […]
Time to pick the trends that will make the industry interesting—or not—next year. This is the time of year when the tech pundits discuss what happened last year and what will happen next year. Usually they miss the points from last year and mess up those for next. But let’s see if I can do any better. The Internet […]
Australia’s cybersecurity capabilities and researchers will be showcased to global players in the United States in February, in a delegation sent to the RSA Conference in San Francisco led by Special Adviser to the Prime Minister on Cyber Security Alastair MacGibbon and recently appointed CEO of the Australian Cyber Security Growth Network Craig Davies. According to Nicola Watkinson, Austrade’s senior trade and investment commissioner for North America, […]
Dubai, 15 December 2016 At the end of October the new cryptocurrency Zcash was launched. It is positioned by its creators as a more secure alternative to Bitcoin. Soon after the launch, the price of Zcash coins skyrocketed, followed by a spike in the installation of the application used to generate Zcash on personal computers. In many of these cases, the app was disguised as something else […]
At a recent media roundtable discussion about the future for wearables, hosted by Vivalnk, I was sitting next to two doctors who have been working in this field as advisers. They told me they don’t know what to do with all the data that patients keep sending them from their wearables, heart rate, steps taken, etc. And some wearables collect data on biometric data that’s unknown to […]
An upcoming deadline for a major derivatives market reform is “unrealistic” and authorities should consider whether the asset managers and banks most affected are ready, a top US regulator has warned. Christopher Giancarlo, the sole Republican of the three commissioners at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, on Friday called on counterparts to prevent new rules due on March 1 from disrupting the global swaps market. His remarks, […]
Day3.jpg Today looks like it’s going to be a really interesting day the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). Talks on human rights, cyber security, and how to stand for diversity and inclusiveness in discussions around how the Internet grows. Day 3: Thursday, December 8 WHAT WHEN / WHERE ISOC REPRESENTATIVE BPF Cybersecurity 9:00-10:30Workshop Room 9 Hiroshi Esaki speaking Human Rights: Broadening the Conversation 10:00 – 13:00Main Session Room Sally Wentworth speaking […]
Can you imagine a bank where artificial intelligence runs checking accounts, debit cards, and wire transfers? Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto The Milan-London startup connection is getting stronger. After MoneyFarm and Soundreef, yet another promising Italian startup, Euklid, is opening up shop in the UK capital, moving its headquarters to be part of the city’s vibrant ecosystem. The team selected London’s Level39 fintech accelerator as its new center of […]
Will this truck be the eyes and ears of the smart city? Credit: USPS The future of the U.S. Postal Service could be as the eyes, ears and sensor network for the smart city. If cities played along the USPS could also derive a revenue stream that could reverse billions of dollars of annual losses. According to a panel at the Smart Cities Summit in Boston, the […]
30 November 2016 Dubai: Emirates NBD, a leading bank in the region, was named ‘Banking and Finance Company of the Year’ at the prestigious Arabian Business Achievement Awards held yesterday (Monday, November 28, 2016). The bank was recognised for its pioneering efforts toward the digitisation of banking as well as its resilient performance in the past year. The Arabian Business Achievement Awards are adjudicated by an independent judging […]
Sweden’s Riksbank is debating whether to become the first significant central bank to issue a digital currency as it responds to an increasing move away from cash in the Scandinavian country. The world’s oldest central bank — it was the first to issue paper banknotes in the 1660s — is launching a project to examine what a central bank-backed digital currency would look like and what challenges […]
By Julia Love and Kristina Cooke | SAN FRANCISCO SAN FRANCISCO Alphabet Inc’s Google said on Monday it is working on a policy change to prevent websites that misrepresent content from using its AdSense advertising network, a move aimed at halting the spread of “fake news” and other types of misinformation on the internet. The shift comes as Google, Facebook Inc and Twitter Inc face a backlash […]
By Hugh Bronstein | BUENOS AIRES BUENOS AIRES Donald Trump’s election as U.S. president raises concern that Washington may increase the intrusiveness of domestic intelligence gathering, former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden said on Monday, warning that democratic checks and balances were losing ground to authoritarianism. Snowden lives in Moscow under an asylum deal after he leaked classified information in 2013 that triggered an international furore […]
The UAE is to join with the World Economic Forum (WEF) to establish the first permanent policy unit to study and implement measures regarding the “Fourth Industrial Revolution” – the transformation of business and society brought about by technological advances. Mohammed Al Gergawi, UAE Minister for Cabinet Affairs and the Future, announced the initiative at the WEF summit of Global Future Councils in Dubai. He promised full […]
INTERNATIONAL. Nine out of 10 banking professionals surveyed at large U.S., European and Canadian commercial banks said their company is currently exploring the use of blockchain technology for payments, according to a new report from Accenture (NYSE: ACN). The initiatives are designed to reduce costs, speed payments, reduce errors and drive new revenues. The report – Blockchain Technology: How banks are building a real-time global payment network – […]
INTERNATIONAL. New research from Long Finance, sponsored by PwC and conducted by Z/Yen, shows the wholesale insurance* market is enthusiastic about implementing blockchain solutions**. The report is based on interviews with brokers, insurers, reinsurers, regulators and trade bodies from across the global wholesale insurance market. As well as cost reduction and improved efficiency, blockchain could be a transformative technology changing the way the industry operates, enabling revenue […]
INTERNATIONAL. Despite significantly increasing investment in compliance and being continuously under the scrutiny of regulators, economic crime in financial services has increased, showing new thinking is needed to make investment in compliance deliver more value and tackle economic crime. The views are published in a new paper by PwC examining how the financial services sector (including Banking & Capital Markets and Insurance) responds to economic crime. Financial […]
KEFLAVIK, Iceland Marco Streng is a miner, though he does not carry a pick around his base in south-western Iceland. Instead, he keeps tens of thousands of computers running 24 hours a day in fierce competition with others across the globe to earn bitcoins. In the world of the web-based digital currency, it is not central banks that add new money to the system, but rather computers […]
Mt. Gox, once the world’s biggest bitcoin exchange, abruptly stopped trading on Tuesday and its chief executive said the business was at “a turning point” but gave no details. Several other digital currency exchanges, including Bitstamp and BTC-E, issued statements attempting to reassure investors of both bitcoin’s viability and their own security protocols. The website of Mt. Gox suddenly went dark on Tuesday with no explanation, and […]
A massive cyber attack from unknown sources that has been spamming bitcoin exchanges is highlighting some of the dangers people can encounter when they exchange cash for digital currencies like the bitcoin, experts said on Wednesday. The attack, which is technically known as a distributed denial of service attack, involved thousands of phantom transactions, forcing at least three of the online platforms that store bitcoins and trade […]
The Bitcoin Foundation said the Mt. Gox Bitcoin exchange in Tokyo is to blame for technical faults that prevented customer withdrawals of the virtual currency that lost as much as 21 percent of its value today. “The issues that Mt. Gox has been experiencing are due to an unfortunate interaction between Mt. Gox’s implementation of their highly customized wallet software, their customer support procedures and their unpreparedness,” […]
