Author: Fintech News Singapore

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…

When we talk about wealth management today in fintech, more often we’re talking about how to create wealth: goal setting, risk profile management, or simply investment management overall. But Dr. Sekar Jaganathan, Director of Digital Strategy in Kenanga Bank opines that “wealth management” as it stands now more often refers to wealth creation: goal setting, risk profile management, and also investment management. Wealth management as the term entails should include data from one’s lifestyle, such as spending habits and insurance. “Wealth management [as an industry] has to grow. Then it has to mature,” said Dr. Sekar. This was one of…

Indonesian fintech startup PAYFAZZ announced that it has invested US$30 million in Xfers, Singapore-headquartered counterpart to form a new financial entity called Fazz Financial Group (FFG). PAYFAZZ said that both companies will retain their respective names whilst operating under the new financial entity where the FFG will oversee their combined mission of providing inclusion through financial services across Southeast Asia. With this investment, Xfers will serve as the designated business-to-business (B2B) arm of FFG, focused on connecting external merchants to the payment infrastructure and user network amassed by FFG as a group. In Indonesia, Xfers currently connects businesses to a…

Symbo Platform Holdings, a Singapore-based insurtech platform, announced the completion of a US$9.4 million funding round led by the CreditEase Fintech Investment Fund. The round also saw participation from San Francisco-based investment firm Think Investments along with follow on investment from existing investors Integra Partners, Insignia Ventures and AJ Capital. With the new investment, the Symbo aims to bolster its core technology platform and leadership team to bring its offerings to scale across India and Southeast Asia. Key areas of investment include recruitment across senior technology and product functions, in addition to senior business development hires in Singapore, Malaysia and…

European supplier of post-trading services Clearstream has selected BearingPoint RegTech, a Netherlands-based compliance technology provider, for its Abacus360 Banking solution for MAS 610 reporting. BearingPoint RegTech said that Abacus360 Banking is a standard software for national and international prudential reporting, statistical reporting as well as granular reporting and ad-hoc reporting. Starting January 2021 onwards, there will be a testing phase with go-live scheduled for July 2021. MAS 610 is the core set of reporting requirements within Singapore’s financial services space, and contains the balance sheet and off-balance sheet information of banks and their underlying details MAS 610 reporting contains the…

The second edition of the Fintech and Digital Banking 2025 in Asia Pacific report by IDC commissioned by Backbase, reveals that APAC banks are going back to the drawing board on their digital transformation programs. Digital banking fitness has been the key factor, with digital banks enjoying three times the growth in customer bases compared to traditional banks. In response, incumbent banks are reinvigorating digital transformation initiatives, having had to accommodate at least a 50% growth in the quantity of digital customer transactions and interactions. It is expected that organisations will undertake a comprehensive realignment of customer engagement projects, with…

KPMG Singapore has named Anton Ruddenklau as its Head of Financial Services with immediate effect. He most recently served as Global Co-Leader of Fintech for KPMG International, and Partner and Head of Digital and Innovation for Financial Services in KPMG in the U.K. Ruddenklau has deep domain expertise in emerging areas such as cryptocurrency and platform-based business models and will harness his experience in digital transformation and customer growth to provide strategic direction and impetus to the financial services practice at KPMG in Singapore. KPMG said in a statement that financial services in Singapore is one of its priority sectors,…