Author: Fintech News Singapore

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) options are rising in popularity in Asia-Pacific (APAC) where consumers are increasingly turning to these payment arrangements to pay for bigger-ticket items like electronics and appliances, findings from a Mastercard study show. A survey conducted by Mastercard World Payments Advisory of 50,000 consumers in over 50 markets, found that interest in BNPL in APAC has risen over the past year. In China, 72% of BNPL users surveyed said they have used the payment option for very expensive items, up 3 percentage points from 2021. In Singapore and Malaysia, that proportion stands at 43% and 24%,…

“Embracing Digital, Charting the New Normal”, the theme for the Singapore Fintech Festival (SFF) Global FinTech Awards 2022, was set keeping in mind the rampant age of digitalisation that is taking over the financial industry. The Global FinTech Hackcelerator and the SFF Global FinTech Awards, hosted by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Singapore Fintech Association (SFA), were held at the SFF from the 2nd to the 4th of November, 2022. Out of a total of 223 submissions across nine categories, there were 36 winners, among which FlexM was awarded 1st place in the honorable ASEAN fintech category.…

Sacombank, one of the largest banks in Vietnam has selected Temenos Infinity to elevate digital banking and deliver a seamless omnichannel experience to retail and business customers. The bank has a customer-centric business strategy and plans to introduce fully digital customer onboarding and origination and enhance the service experience for existing customers through digital channels.  “Vietnam is a strategic market for Temenos. More than 20 Vietnamese banks run on our core banking technology, and we see growing adoption and interest for our Temenos Infinity digital banking platform. Adding Temenos Infinity to the bank’s technology stack will propel the bank forward,…

Singlife with Aviva was formed through the merger of Singlife and Aviva Singapore, bringing together one of the world’s oldest insurers with Singapore’s youngest homegrown financial services company. While the merger was officially completed in January 2022, it also presented the technology teams with the mammoth task of merging the digital-native operations at Singlife with legacy IT systems at Aviva. Ned Lowe, who was formerly the CTO at Singlife, is now leading this critical integration project for the combined company in his Head of Engineering role. When it comes to identity management for the newly combined company, it is a…

BNPL platform Atome has received in-principle approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore to operate as a Major Payment Institution. Once granted, the licence would allow Atome to provide payment services, such as account issuance, domestic and cross-border money transfers, as well as merchant acquisition services. The announcement comes on the back of Atome receiving the Fintech Employer of the Year and ASEAN Fintech Leader awards at the recent Singapore Fintech Festival Global Fintech Awards 2022. Atome also announced in the past week that it has partnered Trip.com and Airwallex to provide their platforms with buy now pay later (BNPL)…

Money20/20 Asia will be held in Bangkok, Thailand on April 23-25 2024. The announcement was made by Money20/20 President Tracey Davies Byers at the recent Money20/20 USA event. 2024 will be the first time Money20/20 Asia is hosted in Thailand. The last Money20/20 Asia event was held in Singapore in 2019 at the Marina Bay Sands and the 2020 event was cancelled due to COVID-19. Money20/20 says that Thailand was selected as it is one of the fastest-growing fintech markets in Asia with over 300 companies in payment processing, e-wallets, insurance, lending and cybersecurity. Founded in 2011, Money20/20 creates destination events…

Sonr, a market intelligence platform for the insurance industry, has released its annual ranking of the world’s leading startups, scaleups and innovators driving change across insurance. Now in its fourth edition, the Insurtech 100 2022 provides a comprehensive compilation of the hottest and most dynamic names in the insurtech space. These companies are digitally-driven insurers, brokers and technological enablers serving the insurance market across the entire value chain, and are being recognized for their ingenuity, growth and traction they’ve witnessed over the past year. The 100 insurtech companies were selected using the Sonr Index, a proprietary scoring technology that incorporates…

Gaming lifestyle brand Razer has partnered with ESG fintech firm STACS to launch Restorify, an e-commerce service with traceable carbon neutral checkout. The partnership empowers Razer customers globally to practice responsible consumerism by allowing them to engage in individual carbon offsets when purchasing Razer products. These individual offsets transactions would be digitally recorded onto STACS’ ESGpedia registry, thereby enhancing the traceability and transparency of the entire carbon credit value chain. Razer says that it will offer partner merchants the Restorify service in future phases, as well as work with STACS on decarbonisation throughout their supply chain. STACS’ ESGpedia registry also…

Travel platform Trip.com has partnered with buy now pay later (BNPL) provider Atome to offer BNPL options to its customers across the region, starting first in Singapore. The partnership is Trip.com’s first-ever regional partnership with a BNPL platform and is expected to expand to other markets in the Asia Pacific region in 2023. Travellers in Singapore can now pay for their flights and accommodations on Trip.com’s mobile app or website through flexible deferred payments by selecting Atome as a checkout option. A recent study by travel tech company Amadeus found that 95 per cent of Singaporean surveyed said they would…

The Swiss Chamber of Commerce and Industry Singapore (SwissCham) hopes to deliver a stronger presence in Singapore and has developed a four-pronged strategy to achieve this goal. The strategy aims to provide more platforms for knowledge transfer and networking, supported by SwissCham’s sub-committees for climate tech, digital transformation, hospitality, and international relations. SwissCham was a key participant under the Swiss Pavilion at the recent Singapore Fintech Festival 2022, during which Swiss blockchain infrastructure startup FQX won at the Global Fintech Hackcelerator. SwissCham currently comprises 200 companies which collectively account for 25,000 jobs in Singapore, including increasing presence from Swiss fintech companies in…

The Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) says that Dubai has continued to attract exceptional interest from financial technology firms, making fintech the centre’s fastest growing sector. The number of fintech and innovation firms joining DIFC in the first nine months of 2022 exceeded the total that established operations during the whole of 2021. DIFC-based fintech firms also secured over US$559 million (AED 2 billion) in funding during the period. The segment previously raised US$ 998 million in 2021, a 78 per cent increase from 2020. According to DIFC Fintech Hive’s 2022 Fintech Report, the segment attained a value of more…

The seventh edition of the Singapore Fintech Festival (SFF), one of the world’s largest annual fintech events, kicked off on October 31, 2022 as an in-person event at the Singapore Expo. This year’s event, themed “Building Resilient Business Models amid Volatility and Change”, saw more than 850 expert speakers, a total of 2,000 organisations and over 250 hours of content across its week-long program. It also featured 450 exhibitors and 25 international pavilions across the exhibition hall. The conference segment of SFF took place on November 2, 3 and 4, and focused heavily on central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), tokenisation,…

The Singapore Fintech Association (SFA) and Accenture Singapore have launched the Singapore Fintech Talent Report in conjunction with the Singapore Fintech Festival 2022. Despite the uncertain macroeconomic environment of 2022, Singapore’s fintech industry continues to grow as does its demand for the right talent. The Singapore Fintech Talent Report 2022 found that demand for fintech talent still outpaced supply with the majority of fintech companies (72%) expecting sector growth to continue accelerating. Most (95%) of the fintech companies surveyed expect an increase in their workforce over the next one to two years as compared to 2021 (84%). However, the talent…

36 companies and individuals have been selected as winners of the SFF Global Fintech Awards 2022 under the theme “Embracing Digital, Charting the New Normal”. The winners, which were announced during the Singapore Fintech Festival’s Fintech Awards Dinner, were selected from 223 submissions and 65 finalists across nine award categories by a panel of 23 judges. Four award categories were presented by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), while five award categories were presented by the Singapore Fintech Association (SFA). The SFF Global Fintech Awards 2022 Winners Singapore Fintech Award Winners (Singapore Founder) ASEAN Fintech Award Winners Singapore Financial Institution…

FQX, norbloc and WeavInsight are the winners of the Global Fintech Hackcelerator 2022, organised by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and Oliver Wyman. This year’s programme, which focuses on Web 3.0 and green finance, was designed based on problem statements from over 50 financial institutions and industry players. The competition comprised local and international scouting programmes. This year’s international programme partners included Accelpoint, F10, Finance for Tomorrow, and Fintech Australia. All 17 finalists received a S$20,000 cash stipend and are eligible for a fast-tracked application for MAS’ Financial Sector Technology and Innovation (FSTI) Proof-of-Concept grant of up to S$200,000.…

Crypto.com is now a Visa associate programme member in Singapore, enabling the company to initiate self-issuance of the Crypto.com Visa card in the country. The Crypto.com Visa Card comes with a cryptocurrency capability and is accepted by more than 80 million Visa merchants, providing cardholders with a variety of benefits across various card tier levels. The company received an in-principle approval for a Major Payment Institution License from the Monetary Authority of Singapore in June and appointed a new country general manager in August. Crypto.com also announced plans to establish its European headquarters in Paris and its regional hub in…

HashKey Capital announced at the Singapore Fintech Festival that it has received in-principle approval for the Capital Markets Services license from the Monetary Authority of Singapore. A full Capital Markets Services license would allow the company to conduct fund management services from Singapore. HashKey Capital is currently a “Recognised Investment Firm” under the Tech@SG programme which aims to help companies hire key talent to grow and expand their business in Singapore. HashKey Capital, the investment arm of the HashKey Group, is an asset manager investing in blockchain technology and digital assets known for being Ethereum’s earliest corporate investor in the…

Asia Pacific accounts for 55% of the global trade finance’s volume. As the region’s trade grows, so does the financing gap. The high cost-to-serve, perceived risks, legacy systems and processes has left US$700 billion worth of unmet demand in emerging Asian economies. As the industry races to close the trade finance gap, digitisation is seen as a crucial enabler; but where do corporates in Asia stand? Which segments have the propensity to adopt a bank’s digital trade platform? What features are most valuable? And what challenges do they face? PSYKHE, a strategic design consultancy that helps organisations in Asia Pacific…

Insurance group Manulife’s wealth management arm has partnered with Singapore-based ESG fintech STACS to monitor the underlying quality of its sustainable investments. Manulife will leverage STACS’ ESGpedia to monitor its investments in sustainability-labelled bonds through visibility of the underlying certifications on both the asset and portfolio level. STACS’ ESGpedia platform includes features for portfolio monitoring, data access and consent management, as well as access to ESG certifications and data from various sectors and verified sources. The platform also powers the Greenprint ESG Registry, one of four pilot projects under the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s Project Greenprint. “STACS ESGpedia portfolio monitoring…

Singapore wants to be a crypto hub, but only if it means being a hub for sound and well-regulated tokenised and digital assets with value-adding use cases, according to the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). This means discouraging retail investment in cryptocurrencies, facilitating stablecoins through regulation, allowing tokenised bank deposits, and experimenting with central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). The position was shared by MAS Managing Director Ravi Menon who was speaking at the Singapore Fintech Festival, the country’s flagship fintech event that is back as an in-person event after three years. Menon stressed that while cryptocurrencies have been all the…