#dltledgers, a Singaporean blockchain platform for cross-border trade, trade finance, and supply chain digitisation, has raised US$ 7 million during a Series A funding round. The fundraising round was led by Regis and Savoy Capital, Vittal, Walden International and various veteran industry leaders. With the funding, #dltledgers has commenced expanding its 70-strong team by 120% across Asia Pacific, ANZ, Japan India and Middle East. To support #dltledgers’ rapid growth, the company will migrate its blockchain-based solutions from Hyperledger Fabric to Corda, R3’s flagship enterprise blockchain platform, enabling businesses in trade finance to streamline business operations, while reducing transaction and record-keeping…

COVID-19 has spurred a spike in e-commerce globally, propelling with it digital payment adoption. In Singapore, digital wallets are set to overtake credit cards as the preferred online payment method over the next four years, and buy now pay later (BNPL) options will grow the fastest, according to the 2021 Global Payments Report by FIS. Released earlier this month, the report looks at how consumers around the world are paying and which methods are set to take the world by storm. In Asia-Pacific (APAC), digital wallets dominated e-commerce payments, accounting for more than 60% of APAC e-commerce payment methods in…

Qoala, an insurtech startup backed by the likes of Sequoia and MDI Ventures announced today the acquisition of FairDee, a Thai insurtech to expand their reach into the Thailand market. Since its 2018 launch, Qoala said that it now processes over 2 million policies per month, with a diversified partnership portfolio serving core industries such as motor vehicle, health, life, travel, fintech, consumables, logistics, and employee benefits. Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Qoala, Harshet Lunani, says: “FairDee and Qoala share the same vision in how insurance can be reimagined. Hence, we are doubling down on developing technology to…

Jumio, a provider of AI-powered end-to-end identity verification and eKYC solutions, today announced it secured a $150 million investment from Great Hill Partners, a private equity firm that invests in high-growth, disruptive companies. This infusion represents the single largest funding round in the digital identity space and speaks to the global importance of establishing a user’s identity remotely to defend against fraud and financial crime, comply with KYC and AML regulations and boost online conversions. They said that the investment will accelerate Jumio’s significant global lead in the digital identity space by devoting additional resources to automate its identity verification…

Against the backdrop of the cacophony of noise and emerging trends in Asia, it’s difficult even for the keenest of observers to determine what trends will shape the future of fintech in Asia. On the 6th episode of Fintech Fireside Asia, we were joined by Brett King, an inductee of CB Insights’ Fintech Hall of Fame and ardent futurist to shed some light on the matter. The following is a summary of the conversation between Brett and Vincent Fong, Chief Editor of Fintech News Malaysia. Is it True That Challenger Banks are Struggling? Xinja, a digital bank in Australia had…

Ripple  announced the appointment of Brooks Entwistle as Managing Director of Southeast Asia to lead and scale the company’s operations in the region. Based out of Ripple’s Southeast Asia headquarters in Singapore, Brooks Entwistle brings three decades of senior management experience in both the financial services and technology industries, with the mission to drive digital asset and blockchain adoption in the region. His appointment comes at a time when the company is deepening and expanding its presence across this dynamic region for RippleNet, which includes 14 countries. Brooks was most recently the Chief Business Officer International at Uber, where he…

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of digital technologies in all sectors and across all regions. In Asia Pacific (APAC), insurers have recognized the importance of system modernization for the long-term success of their business. Yet, most are still allocating slim financial resources on such initiatives, an important hurdle that insurers need to overcome to make a successful move to the cloud, Arvind Swami, director of financial services for Red Hat’s APAC operations, told Fintech News Singapore. These statements come on the back of the release of a new research his company commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct. The study…

OCBC Bank has introduced the use of facial biometrics for ATM services, eliminating the need to carry around an ATM card. The bank claims to be the first in Southeast Asia to enable the use of face verification on its ATM for account balance enquiries, which will be first rolled out on eight ATMs around Singapore. OCBC will then extend face verification for cash withdrawals to all OCBC ATMs in Singapore progressively. This latest move comes after the bank’s rollout of QR code cash withdrawals in July 2019. OCBC said that account balance enquiries and cash withdrawals are the most…

Singapore-based digital wealth advisor Endowus has launched its Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) portfolios, to pave the way for retail investors to gain access to better sustainable investing options. Fund managers include J.P. Morgan Asset Management, Natixis-Mirova, PIMCO, Schroders and UOB Asset Management-Robeco. Endowus’ ESG offering comes on the back of Singapore’s launch of a concerted national drive towards a more sustainable future. This move is illustrated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS)’s commitment in 2019 to invest US$2 billion to establish Singapore as a global hub for sustainability and green finance. This was followed by the nation’s October…

Singapore is looking to leverage its position as one of the world’s most developed fintech markets to become a leader in green fintech, a vision part of a broader movement for the nation to become sustainable. During a speech at the Singapore Fintech Awards Night on February 10, 2021, Grace Fu, Minister for Sustainability and the Environment of Singapore, highlighted Singapore’s massive fintech ecosystem, which currently represents more than 40% of all fintech companies in the Southeast Asian region. Simultaneously, the nation is ASEAN’s largest green finance market, accounting for close to 50% of cumulative green bond and loan issuances.…

Callsign, a London-based artificial intelligence-driven identity and authentication solutions provider, has named Singapore as its headquarters for the Asia Pacific region which will expand throughout 2021. Callsign has chosen Singapore as the Asia Pacific headquarters due to the increase in demand for regulatory compliant authentication and fraud prevention solutions across South East Asia. According to a recent report from PWC, 42% of companies surveyed in Singapore compared with 47% globally, experienced incidents of fraud and economic crime within the past 24 months. Callsign has also appointed Namrata Jolly as General Manager for the Asia Pacific region, and she will oversee…

Wise, a London-based online money transfer service formerly known as TransferWise, has made two recent appointments to its board of directors, one of it being Tan Hooi Ling who is the Co-founder of South East Asian superapp Grab. The other new addition to Wise’s board is Clare Gilmartin who was formerly the CEO of Trainline, a British digital rail and coach ticketing platform. Wise was launched in 2011 as a money transfer service for people and has now expanded to build a cross-border payments network with a userbase of 10 million personal and business customers. Hooi Ling’s appointment coincides with…

With approximately 200 million active users and 30 million merchants, Indian payment players are now riding the growth of digital payments to expand to other financial segments beyond their core offerings, including wealth management, insurance and lending, says a new Credit Suisse report. In a paper titled India Fintech Sector: A Guide to the Galaxy, the Swiss bank looks at the state of fintech in India, highlighting the phenomenal growth of digital payments and delving into some of the country’s top players growth tactics. According to the paper, digital payment startups have largely led the scale up of fintechs in…

Following the official launch of Trusple, AntChain’s international trade and financial services platform, DBS announced that it is the first Asian bank to successfully close a trade financing transaction on the platform, valued at over US$ 40,000. The transaction was closed on behalf of iQuartz, a Singapore SME that manufactures, fabricates and distributes quartz stones to its USA and Singapore customers in the building materials market. DBS said that with Trusple, iQuartz’s trade order was immediately registered on the blockchain, enhancing transparency and giving iQuartz greater oversight of its supply chain. Once the trade commitment has been fulfilled and acknowledged…

Pioneered by banking incumbents, India’s open banking ecosystem has grown to become part of the Indian financial landscape and is now among one of the most advanced in the world. The development of open banking in India has been facilitated by the digital public infrastructure put in place by the government. Sameer Singh Jaini and Shashank Shekhar from Indian fintech consulting and advisory firm The Digital Fifth, identify five key layers in the India open banking ecosystem as: the banking layer, the technology layer enablers at banks, the third-party API layer, the customer layer, and the enabling layer. Banks and…

Bank of Thailand (BOT) announced the results of its Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) for Business Prototype Development Project and revealed plans to focus on retail CBDC as its next step. Initiated in June 2020, Project Inthanon marks the first time the BOT expanded the scope of CBDC development to business users. The CBDC project was conducted in collaboration between BOT, Siam Cement Group (SCG), and Digital Ventures Company Limited (DV) with support from technology provider ConsenSys. The project aimed to explore how CBDC can be used by the business sector to enhance efficiency and flexibility of payments while supporting…

Fundamental shifts in consumer preferences, favorable regulation, and rising interest from investors are stimulating the growth of insurtech in India. Results of a survey conducted by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) found that 65% of general insurance customers in India had a digital footprint in the purchase journey, and 30% got influenced during the journey. The digital trend is expected to grow moving forward with 88% of Indian customers expressing willingness to purchase through digital channels. These findings come on the back of rising investors’ interest in the country’s…

Futu Holdings announced the official launch of its one-stop investment platform, moomoo and unveiled the opening of its new regional headquarters in Singapore. The company said in a statement that the new headquarters was set up to better serve the Southeast Asia region. This move marks Futu’s first market entry outside of China. moomoo, which is strategically backed by Tencent, seeks to be the technology-driven and international version of Futu’s investing platform. It is also regulated and licensed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). Futu said the “investment platform is focused on empowering both seasoned and the younger generation…

With a new Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) model, financial services providers can save up to 95 percent of a typical customer acquisition cost, according to a new report from Oliver Wyman. The report said that the typical customer acquisition cost can be reduced from a range of $100 to $200 to between $5 to $35. The report, The Rise of Banking as a Service, expects the BaaS model to rise as a new battleground for financial incumbents and their digital challengers, as the model has the potential to generate significant new revenue growth for both financial and non-financial businesses. BaaS is enabled…

Though no legal regulation on open banking currently exists in Thailand, the government’s digital push with the Thailand 4.0 strategy, and the introduction the Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA) last year suggest a move to open banking frameworks is inevitable. Compared to the likes of Singapore and Malaysia, Thailand is lagging behind when it comes to open banking with neither the central bank nor regulator having yet released any framework or guidelines. Instead, there has been a broader ambition by the government to elevate Thailand in an increasingly advanced digital generation. In 2016, it launched Thailand 4.0, a proposed economic…