Author: Fintech News Singapore

On 18 April 2020, with the Circuit Breaker period still in effect, OCBC Bank took the highly-regulated wealth advisory process – a complex face-to-face process involving over 50 pages of documents and a comprehensive Financial Needs Analysis (FNA) – online. OCBC Bank registered an increase of 45% in the sale of wealth management products in the first 10 days of launch compared to the prior 10 days, indicating a positive response from customers to non-face-to-face wealth conversations. The products range from unit trusts to bancassurance products, and from structured investments and bonds to foreign exchange products. As a result, customers…

In Southeast Asia, Singapore has been leading the way when it comes to fintech innovation. As of late 2019, the city state was home to more than 600 fintech firms, which had attracted over half of total funding for the region for that year. To help the sector stay afloat amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has launched two major support packages. The first, announced on April 8, 2020, is a S$125 million COVID-19 care package for the financial and fintech sectors. The package aims to support the sectors in facing the immediate challenges from the…

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced on Monday the launch of a S$1.75 million MAS Global FinTech Innovation Challenge. The competition will seek innovative solutions that can help financial institutions respond to two critical global challenges: COVID-19 and climate change. The theme for the competition is “Building Resilience, Seizing Opportunities, Emerging Stronger”. Through the competition, MAS aims to promote fintech solutions that will help financial institutions adapt effectively to the new operating environment precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic as well as apply fintech capabilities to spur the development of green finance in Asia and globally. The competition comprises the…

Key Topics: Case studies and use cases for AI within FSI Challenges, pitfalls, and current realities Data governance and management AI Ethics in Financial Services Speakers: Dr David Hardoon, Senior Advisor Data & AI, UnionBank Prior to his advisory role to UnionBank, Dr Hardoon was a Chief Data Officer at Monetary Authority of Singapore. He considers himself a data artist instead of a pure data scientist Foong Chee Mun, CTO & Co-Founder, Money Lion Chee Mun co-founded MoneyLion a US-based neobank listed as Forbes’ Fintech 2020. As the CTO he leads the data science team situated in Kuala Lumpur. Andy…

The digital payments market is predicted to be valued at US$1 Trillion dollars by 2025. Joining us to discuss the future of this very exciting market are: Ooi Huey Tyng, Managing Director, Head of GrabPay Venkatesh Saha, Head, APAC & Middle East Expansion, TransferWise Henri Arslanian, Global Crypto Leader, PwC Simon Keates, Head of Global Strategy, Payment Security, Thales

More than 1,000-percent increase in the growth was recorded in May in transaction value coursed through Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation’s (RCBC) cardless ATM withdrawal service, as the bank sustains its exponential growth across key digital metrics at the close of the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) and the modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ). Daily transaction count of cardless ATM withdrawals during the ECQ period grew 906 percent from those recorded before the enforcement of the lockdown on March 16. An increase in usage rate during the succeeding days kept the momentum going for RCBC. Digital banking enrolment was up 193 percent…

Singapore recently issued guidelines for digibanks which paves the way for a whole new breed of banks. In this webinar, we’re joined by two of the applicants and two experts to explore how this could reinvent financial services in Singapore: Eduard Fabian, CTO, Razer Fintech Andrew Taggart, Partner, PwC Nisha Paramjothi, SVP, Matchmove Anand Subbaraman, GM Finastra

Gojek announced today that Facebook and PayPal have joined Google, Tencent and others as investors in its current fundraise. This new investment will support Gojek’s mission to boost Southeast Asia’s digital economy, with a focus on supporting payments and financial services in the region. With digital payments adoption primed to accelerate exponentially, the resources of some of the world’s leading global tech businesses will be combined with the local focus and technology of Gojek to benefit millions of businesses and people across Indonesia and Southeast Asia. Gojek’s payments business, GoPay has long been focused on increasing access to the digital…

Over 70% of adults in Southeast Asia currently lack sufficient access to financial services and millions of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the region still face large funding gaps. The underbanked and unbanked is often overlooked by incumbent banks due to low margins, however, with the emergence of new technologies fintech startups are increasingly able to find a commercially viable model to provide the much-needed service to plug the gap in the market. With fintech set to reinvent how consumers spend, save and invest across the region, we look today at seven startups that are bringing financial services to…

COVID-19 continues to spread in Singapore with now more than 30,400 confirmed cases and over 20 deaths, according to the latest data from the John Hopkins University. Though the numbers continue to rise, with 614 new cases of COVID-19 infection being unveiled just on May 22, the government is planning to further ease restrictions starting next month. On the economic front, the Singapore economy contracted by 2.2% year-on-year in the first quarter due to the outbreak and the global measures put in place, reports Channel News Asia. The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) has downgraded its GDP growth forecast…

Swiss FinTech NetGuardians, best known for its AI risk platform that combats banking fraud, today announced a new partnership with banking platform Mambu. The new partnership focuses on digital payment fraud, meaning that NetGuardians’ fraud-mitigation software will be available to Mambu’s customers for seamless integration into the core banking platform. Mambu said it currently has more than 160 customers, including some of the likes of ZestMoney, The Wallet Engine and Nimble. According to recent research, the global digital payments sector is seeing an annual compound growth rate of 13.7 percent and will be worth $8.7 trillion within five years. Digital…

A global survey by Finastra shows financial institutions in Singapore are supportive of the Open Banking movement and fintech collaboration, with 86% either committed to or considering opening their APIs in the next 12 months. Nearly all respondents (98%) said Open Banking is important to their organization, with 89% believing that collaboration has made their business more efficient. The research was conducted prior to the Coronavirus outbreak amongst 774 financial institutions and banks across the US, UK, Singapore, France, Germany, Hong Kong and UAE. 110 organizations in Singapore were included. However, the survey also found that a number of financial…

With COVID-19 continuing to claim victims and governments still enforcing strict public health rules, online events are providing professionals with the opportunity to keep up with trends and build contacts without the need to travel. Today, we’re giving you our pick of the top 21 virtual conferences and online summits for fintech professionals taking place in the coming months. Digital Week Online May 25 – 31, 2020 Digital Week Online is a global online event focused on innovations, startups, investments, new technologies. The week-long event will be led by 48 hours of non-stop online conference suiting multiple time zones from…

Singapore is one of the world’s richest countries. The country’s wealth is mostly due to its low unemployment rate, stable economy, superfast internet speed, and a vibrant e-commerce marketplace. Singapore enjoys the fastest-growing e-commerce industry in Southeast Asia, with projections suggesting that the country’s e-commerce will be worth S$7.5 billion by 2025. The steady rise in online trade in Singapore is partly attributed to the presence of e-commerce platforms such as Shopify. The government of Singapore has also contributed immensely to the growth of the e-commerce industry in the country, through incentives like SME grants. These incentives allow SMEs to…

CapBridge a Singapore based private market eco-system comprising announced that it has received equity investments from SGInnovate and Cyberport Macro Fund, further attesting to its strong government support and growing regional network. SGInnovate is a private-limited company wholly owned by the Singapore Government that helps entrepreneurial scientists build and scale Deep Tech startups through equity-based investments, access to talent, and business-building advice. Hong Kong Cyberport is the digital technology flagship with more than 1,500 start-ups and technology companies. Launched in 2016, Cyberport Macro Fund is a testament to its pledge to give start-ups that extra push they need to excel…

Finastra today announced the launch of its Fusion Credit Connect solution on Salesforce AppExchange and Finastra’s FusionFabric.cloud. They said this is re-envisioning how relationship managers and borrowers connect and communicate from opportunity to origination, through to closing and booking. Corporate lending end-users benefit from a better customer experience across the whole process of securing and drawing down a loan. Built on the Salesforce Platform, the Fusion Credit Connect solution is currently available on the AppExchange and on Finastra’s FusionFabric.cloud. With increasing competitive pressure from fintechs in direct lending, and greater customer expectations around immediate access and service, banks need to…

MyCash Money Pte Ltd. has introduced wallet-to-wallet remittance services through the bKash Wallet from Singapore to Bangladesh. This  integration enables migrant workers in the isolation areas of Singapore to transfer real-time money directly to any bKash wallet account in Bangladesh using the MyCash Wallet app and website. MyCash Group CEO Mehedi Hasan said, “Over 100,000 Bangladeshis currently working in Singapore and most of them are now living inside isolated dormitories. To make their life easy and help them and their families to enjoy the upcoming Eid, we have brought this service to them. We are excited to able to help…

In this webinar we discuss how fintech startups can thrive and survive the COVID-19 crisis. We are joined by Dato’ Ng Wan Peng, COO, Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) Yuen Tuck Siew, Co-Founder Jirnexu (Ringgit Plus) Wong Kah Meng, Co-Founder, Funding Societies Wong Wai Ken, Country Manager, StashAway

Financial institutions (FIs) in Singapore will be allowed to reopen more customer service locations from 2 June 2020. This will be carried out with strict safe management requirements in place, to minimise the risk of COVID-19 infections, in line with the Ministry of Health (MOH)’s three-phased approach to resume business operations. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) will allow FIs more onsite staff to meet increased customer needs as some businesses re-open, as well as to serve customers using both online and offline channels more efficiently. Most FI staff will continue to work from home as telecommuting remains the default…

With COVID-19 continuing to put a toll on the global economy and disrupt the live event business, webinars and virtual meetups have surged in number over the past months to provide professional and industry participants with the opportunity to connect and network. For fintech professionals located in an Asian time zone, we have rounded up the 10 best digital banking and fintech webinars from May 20. Cyber Security Threat Landscape for Fintechs and Financial Institutions Nov 18, 2020, 10:00 SGT Cyber security is a growing headache for any knowledge intensive business including fintech, PE, hedge funds and other financial institutions…