VIAINVEST blog

Still getting some of those GDPR emails? Same here. As boring as it could sound, we are talking about an important new privacy regulation that came into force on May 25th and basically will affect everyone engaged in the digital world. We already introduced GDPR and its requirements a few months ago, but now we can actually observe how this new set of rules has affected the business. In this blog post, we will take a look at how financial and fintech companies are affected by the GDPR. Continue reading GDPR and its impact on financial industry

The first half of 2018 has already been significant for the payments industry and will bring unprecedented changes and developments in the nearest future. With open banking and PSD2 coming into the force the industry is expected to see an acceleration in the process of substantial transformation that was triggered a few years ago by the boom of the fintech industry. Continue reading The Payments Industry is Booming

A new quarter brings a new record of fintech investments. According to the newest report by CB Insights, $5.4 billion has been raised across 323 deals by VC backed financial technology companies in Q1 2018, marking it the best quarter that has ever been registered globally. Continue reading Quarterly Record for Global VC Investments in Fintech

The unicorn club, which once was just part of the Silicon Valley myth, is now a reality also in Europe, where the number of unicorns (a term used for private technology companies valued at $1 billion or more) is now growing constantly. This is something that has to be taken as great news for the growth of the market. Here we take a look at those unicorns that are operating within the industry in Europe. Continue reading Who Are European Fintech Unicorns of 2018?

The past few decades of technology development show some noticeable trends like centralization with the creation of tech giants like Apple, Google, Amazon, and Facebook, as well as decentralization that fostered the development of cloud computing, the rapid growth of peer-to-peer lending and crowdfunding, and and the most recent hype – the outbreak of the distributed ledger technologies, such as blockchain, that enables cryptocurrencies and promises complete decentralization. Continue reading Blockchain for Business: A Brief Intro to Hyperledger

European financial institutions are now facing challenging times. With new game-changing regulations like PSD2 and MiFID II entering into force, open banking is no longer a utopia. New rules are going to cause a shock for financial incumbents that are not prepared to embrace innovation, adding up some considerable competition from fintech startups and more established firms that will definitely take advantage of new geographies and lower barriers to enter the market. Continue reading Which European Banks are Leading the Investment Flow in Fintech?

Cross-border payments startup Ripple and Spanish bank Santander made headlines for a recently inked partnership in which the pair have developed a new blockchain-fueled payments app. It’s already been rolled out across Spain, the UK, Brazil, and Poland to start and will be expanded further in the coming months. They have their sights set on Portugal next. Continue reading Digital Payments Innovation Heats Up

European countries have always shown meaningful differences in their savings and investment habits, with significant changes observed in the past decade, especially during the 2008 global financial crisis and the 2011 euro area sovereign debt crisis. Here we take a brief look at what are habits of Europeans regarding planning their cash flow, as well as explain few personal finance management solutions that have emerged in recent years along with the development of fintech. Continue reading Planning personal finances: how Europeans manage their money

Peer-to-peer (P2P) lending has already made its mark on fintech. It’s taken market share from banks and inspired companies like KeyCorp, which has USD 138 billion in assets, to overhaul its consumer lending platform to stay relevant. In fact, Ron Suber, who is known as the Godfather of Fintech, told American Banker that Key needs this upgrade to go head-to-head with the likes of fintech and Amazon.

Now the P2P model is spilling over into other industries, from e-commerce and payments, to the auto sector and transportation. Let’s explore some of the latest developments. Continue reading Amazon, FedEx and GM Explore P2P Offerings