Shakespeare: Monzo’s tough year doesn’t improve with new card November 4, 2020 Monzo has had a tough 2020 so far. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the challenger bank has laid off employees, doubled its losses, and faced difficult questions about its viability as a “going concern”. October proved to be no exception. New data from YouGov BrandIndex shows that Monzo’s latest attempt to launch paid-for accounts adversely affected [...]
Paypoint signs deal to sell Romanian division for £47m October 21, 2020 Paypoint has inked a deal to sell its Romanian division to Innova Capital for £47m, as the payments operator seeks to streamline its UK business in the wake of the pandemic. In a notice to the stock exchange, the London-listed firm said it had reached an agreement with Innova to offload Paypoint Services and Payzone, [...]
It’s time for a fresh UK-China relationship August 14, 2020 The UK needs a fresh template for its relationship with China. Central to this should be a differentiation between strategic and non-strategic areas. This would allow UK businesses to know where the government has set its red lines. In 2015, the UK and China’s relationship was red hot—a “golden era”—with President Xi making a state [...]
Why Open Banking is the next finance revolution January 15, 2020 The saying that the “customer is king” has been an accepted truism for a long time. But it is only recently that this has really been the case, with technology largely driving a shift of power away from traditional providers to the consumer. Think of how music streaming services like Spotify completely changed how we [...]
How can online-only banks win over cautious consumers? September 27, 2019 The direction of travel for banking is clear – we’re moving away from highstreets and onto smartphones. But tech should not outpace consumer confidence, and lessons on how to do that can be drawn from the payments industry. This week Which? reported that a third of UK bank branches have closed in the last five [...]
Banks, don’t forget about the human touch August 8, 2019 Technology is transforming how we all live our lives. This is true in every part of the country and in every sector, and banking is no different. But the challenge for banks is to harness the possibilities of rapidly-evolving technology for the benefit of our customers. New banking tech affects how we live our lives, [...]
Fintech darling Monzo urges 500,000 users to change PINs after security bug August 5, 2019 Digital challenger bank Monzo has urged users to change their PINs after admitting a data breach allowed members of staff to access security information. The fintech said around a fifth of customers were affected by the leak, which saw some PINs stored in encrypted log files that Monzo engineers had access to. Read more: Losses [...]
Revolut ‘to appoint Martin Gilbert as chairman in next few weeks’ July 14, 2019 Revolut is reportedly gearing up to appoint Martin Gilbert as its first ever chairman in a bid to strengthen governance and improve investor sentiment ahead of an upcoming fundraising. Gilbert, a former co-chief executive of Standard Life Aberdeen (SLA), was first confirmed as an adviser to chief Nikolay Storonsky in March. Read more: Revolut fights [...]
Challenger banks struggling to compete with big five banks on cash deposits, study finds May 30, 2019 Challenger banks are struggling to break the stranglehold of the big five banks on the UK's £1.3 trillion cash deposit market, despite often paying better interest rates. The UK's big five banks – Barclays, Lloyds, HSBC, Santander and the Royal Bank of Scotland – hold £827bn of the UK's household deposits, a market share of [...]
Tesco Bank quits ‘challenging’ mortgage market May 21, 2019 Tesco Bank has thrown in the towel on mortgages, ceasing all new lending as it attempts to sell of its existing ledger book. Read more: How London house prices in every borough have performed in 2019 Currently the bank has 23,000 mortgage customers who it has lent £3.7bn, a portfolio it is now exploring the [...]