What The FinTech #120 - 21 Nov 2022
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HONG KONG
HKEX taps SGX’s exec to grow business in South Asia & Middle East
HKEX taps SGX’s exec to grow business in South Asia & Middle East
The Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEX) has appointed Narendra Hegde, the Director of International Sales for Asia at the Singapore Exchange Limited (SGX) Group, as its Head of Business Development in South Asia and the Middle East.Hegde, an industry veteran with over 18 years of experience in sales and client services in the fintech industry, announced his appointment on Friday on LinkedIn. The executive takes up the new role after almost 10 years at SGX Group, a securities and derivatives trading provider he joined in March 2013. At SGX, he spearheaded the market operator’s sales and marketing efforts to promote its business in South Asia and the Middle East. The goal, he noted, was to increase the group’s market shares and drive revenue growth for SGX's derivatives and cash markets. Throughout a career span of close to two decades, Hegde has worked with top financial organizations such as the Singapore Mercantile Exchange (SMX), Credit Suisse, UBS Investment Bank and Sun Microsystems, a subsidiary of the software company, Oracle Corporation.
SINGAPORE
OCBC Bank and NTU Singapore to embark on a S$5 million research collaboration
More merchants are now accepting Alipay+ in S’pore
OCBC Bank and NTU Singapore to embark on a S$5 million research collaboration
OCBC Bank and Nanyang Technological University Singapore (NTU Singapore) announced that they have embarked on a S$5 million research collaboration over the next five years, to develop innovative technological solutions in three key areas –sustainability, data privacy and cyber security. NTU’s SCRIPTS specialises in developing privacy-preserving technologies, which are essential prerequisites in ensuring data protection and data privacy. NTU’s research partnership with OCBC is also in line with NTU2025, the University’s five-year strategic plan that aims to address humanity’s grand challenges, such as the impact of technology on humanity and mitigating our impact on the environment.
More merchants are now accepting Alipay+ in S’pore
Alipay+ is a cross-border digital payments and marketing solution to connect digital payment users and global merchants. Simply said, it allows users to make payments in overseas markets using their local e-wallets.To date, Alipay+ is acceptedby global merchants both online and offline across 70 markets, and adopted by over 2.5 million merchants worldwide. The latest phase of the partnership includes the ‘SingapoReimagine with Alipay+’ joint marketing campaign. As part of SingapoReimagine, it offers innovative experiences to travellers across Asia, while allowing transactions in Singapore through mobile wallets that they are already familiar with. With more mobile apps partnering with Alipay+, cross-border payment is made so much easier and more convenient. In particular, three new mobile wallets –namely GCash from the Philippines, TrueMoney from Thailand, and AlipayHK from Hong Kong SAR, China –are now accepted in Singapore through Alipay+. Other existing partners include Kakao Pay from South Korea, Touch ‘n Go eWallet from Malaysia and Alipay from the Chinese Mainland, bringing the total number of mobile wallets accepted via Alipay+ in Singapore to six.
CHINA
Tencent could be close to formally releasing palm-print payment technology
AliPay+ transactions up 40% during singles day shopping event
Tencent could be close to formally releasing palm-print payment technology
WeChat Pay has been testing out palm-print payment devices in the country for months, according to social media posts collected by MIT Technology Review. Supporters of palm-print recognition say the technology is more accurate and more secure than other forms of biometrics, and it’s harder to identify a person if their palm-print image gets leaked. So while fingerprint and facial recognition has already been widely used in identity verification scenarios, the technology that distinguishes different palms—including the visible lines and the veins beneath the skin—has quickly become the next frontier of biometrics recognition. While a lack of training data has slowed the technology’s development, it is now almost ready for mass commercial application, says several researchers involved. That said, even with palm-print recognition’s benefits, installation to such a ubiquitous extent would still come with privacy risks for consumers and analysts and privacy activists remain sceptical that palm-print recognition should be used in payments.
AliPay+ transactions up 40% during singles day shopping event
During the 10 days leading up to China’s Singles Day shopping event, there was a 40% increase in the number of online transactions via the Alipay+ payment platform compared to the same period last year.The digital and entertainmentsector saw the highest level of user participation this year, achieving over 200% growth, followed by the online-to-offline and eCommerce sectors. The growth was fueled by an increase in eWallet activity, with the company stating in the release that Southeast Asian wallets including GCash, TrueMoney, Touch ’n Go, DANA and Kakao Pay contributed to the increased transaction volume. During the 10-day period, the platform helped merchants accept payments from over 100 million digital wallet users, and first-time users of Alipay+ saw a large increase in sales.Alipay+’s global merchant coverage has more than doubled to over 2.5 million over the past six months.
ASIA
Indian fintech Lentra raises $60M to expand loans-as-a-service for banks
PayMate Addresses Working Capital Needs With B2B Payments Expansion Into Singapore and Sri Lanka
Southeast Asia central banks ink deal to boost cross-border payments
R3 teams up with ADB to explore use of Blockchain in sustainability, digital assets
Indian fintech Lentra raises $60M to expand loans-as-a-service for banks
Lentra, an Indian embedded AI-based finance startup, has raised $60 million in a Series B financing round that values the startup at over $400 million. The Mumbai-based startup works with commercial banks to power their digital loan service and offers a variety of loan tools that address banks’ lending needs. These include Lentra Lending Cloud, which gives ready-to-use third-party API connectors to various data sources, a Loan Management System (LMS) as well as a no-code Business rules engine (BREx) with modules for clients to use out-of-the-box. The startup also has a platform called GoNoGo in its catalogue that helps banks ascertain whether a loan should be given to a customer once they get their application. With the fresh funding, Lentra, which has a presence in Singapore, plans to expand into Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam. Post the initial expansion, the startup intends to go beyond Asia and enter the U.S.
PayMate Addresses Working Capital Needs With B2B Payments Expansion Into Singapore and Sri Lanka
PayMate, an Indian payments processing company has incorporated and registered its entities in Singapore and Sri Lanka to extend its B2B payment platform. PayMate’s general services work to digitise and automate business payments in supply chains. Local large enterprises and SMBs in Singapore and Sri Lanka who adopt the company’s platform can use bank-issued commercial credit cards to make early payments towards supplier invoices, extending their days payable. The platform reconciles all incoming and outgoing payments, allowing analysis of business cash flow for CFOs and finance managers to improve their working capital. Other noteable features include custom approval workflows, APIs, spending reports and integrations with ERPs; furthering the efficiency of payable and receivable processes.
Southeast Asia central banks ink deal to boost cross-border payments
Five central banks in Southeast Asia have signed a deal to make cross-border payments faster and cheaper as part of efforts to deepen financial integration in the region. The central banks of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines and Thailand on Monday said they expect the dealto be a "significant contributor to accelerating regional economic recovery and promoting inclusive growth," supporting cross-border trade, investment, remittance, tourism and other things. The deal will include cooperation on QR codes and fast payment, the banks said in a joint statement, without elaborating further.
R3 teams up with ADB to explore use of Blockchain in sustainability, digital assets
Global enterprise software firm R3 has partnered with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to explore the use of distributed ledger technology (DLT) in driving digital transformation. The partnership involves a proof-of-concept (POC) project aimed at establishing a cross-border multi-currency securities settlement system based on DLT in Asia Pacific. It will also look into the relevance of DLT for ADB’s institutional priorities and in support of its operational priorities. The partnership will also explore DLT use cases in key industry verticals such as sustainability, accountability and traceability, digital assets, and identity and Know Your Customer (KYC)across the region. As part of the scope of the agreement, ADB’s potentially qualified startups will also be referred to R3’s Venture Development Programme. The programme is dedicated to accelerating and cultivating multi-party applications built on R3’s Corda and Conclave platforms, by early-stage startups to shorten their time to market.
BLOCKCHAIN - CRYPTO - DIGITAL ASSETS - DE FI
Nike launches Web3 Platform .SWOOSH
US banks launch digital asset settlement platform PoC
Coinbase enables instant deposits with TrueLayer
RockX, OKX Chain to bring cross-chain interoperability to Web3 Apps
Launching DBFI token to bring Crypto Banking into reality
Nike launches Web3 Platform .SWOOSH
Apparel company Nike has announced the launch of .Swoosh, a blockchain-enabled platform and community ecosystem for web3-curious Nike consumers. Membership to the beta version begins this month, with plans to launch the first digital collectibles in 2023 with input from .Swoosh members. The .Swoosh platform will allow members to learn, collect and co-create virtual apparel and related goods which can be worn in the metaverse. The .Swoosh community members will also stand a chance to participate in exclusive physical products and events with world-renowned athletes and designers. This strategy is made possible by Nike’s recent acquisition of RTFKT Studios, a startup that uses NFT, blockchain authentication and augmented reality to create one of a kind digital sneakers and other collectibles. Although .Swoosh is a separate project from RTFKT, it uses similar tools and technologies.
US banks launch digital asset settlement platform PoC
Citi, Mastercard, Wells Fargo and the New York Fed's innovation centre are among those involved in the 12-week project to explore the feasibility of an interoperable digital money platform known as the regulated liability network (RLN). The PoC will test a version of the RLN design that operates exclusively in US dollars where commercial banks issue simulated digital money or “tokens” - representing the deposits of their own customers - and settle through simulated central bank reserves on a shared multi-entity distributed ledger. The project will also test the feasibility of a programmable digital money design that is potentially extensible to other digital assets, as well as the viability of the proposed system within existing laws and regulations.
Coinbase enables instant deposits with TrueLayer
Coinbase has tapped open banking technology from TrueLayer to deliver real-time instant deposits to UK users. Within weeks, users will be able to link their bank account directly to Coinbase and begin making near instant deposits without the need to manually enter their bank account details. By selecting the 'Easy Bank Transfer' option when adding funds to their account, users can authenticate their payment directly from their mobile banking app, confirm their payment, and then be redirected back to Coinbase.
RockX, OKX Chain to bring cross-chain interoperability to Web3 Apps
RockX, one of Asia’s largest staking solutions and institutional-grade blockchain access node providers, has “integrated with OKX Chain (OKC), an EVM-compatible layer one blockchain, to provide cross-chain node services for users to access the OKC ecosystem.”With this integration, users and developers will “be able to enjoy full access to all OKC-based protocols through RockX and build on a secure and programmable smart contracts platform for Web3 decentralized applications.” RockX and OKC’s integrated infrastructure will “include an open-source, all-in-one multi-chain Web3 interface, enabling a seamless experience for both developers and users to build, scale and launch their own dApps with low gas fees.”
Launching DBFI token to bring Crypto Banking into reality
Trustlane, a crypto project that originated in Indonesia will launch DBFI token based on ERC20 in Ethereum blockchain. DBFI platform differs from DEFI (Decentralized Finance), as the former utilizes centralized systems to enable transaction process, as opposed to non centralized authority systems adopted by DEFI. The uniqueness of the Trustlane platform allows data organization and digital assets within the hybrid blockchain ecosystem before any transactions forwarded to public blockchain. The platform enables any digital asset to conform, registered and itemized. The development of the DBFI ecosystem targets B2B sectors which require a simple, transparent and protected business transaction process. The Trustlane platform uses smart contracts which can be programmed by third parties. The smart contract is an open smart contract (OSM) that can be programmed and used for identification in monetary transactions, investment, confirmation and sending secure messaging between corporations and financial institutions. One of the roadmaps within the Trustlane ecosystem is to issue stablecoins having one-to-one (1:1) value with the respective fiat currencies such as Euro, US dollar, Indonesian Rupiah, etc. The stablecoins are used for transaction intermediary within the Trustlane ecosystem. Trustlane issued stablecoins are not affected by crypto volatility as they are backed up by fiat cash locked in custodial banks and regularly audited.
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