London Fintech Podcast

I am delighted to be joined on the show today by Mike Laven CEO of Currency Cloud (who have always been my “Fintech insiders” Fintech of choice). Currency Cloud has done $10bn of business which is a big number on anyone’s scale. It’s a rare guest indeed that I would give so broad a topic […]

I am delighted to be joined on the show today by Goncalo de Vasconcelos CEO and founder of Syndicate Room who are one of my must-know-about equity crowdfunding platforms as they have originated an “investor-led” model of equity crowdfunding which has some powerful advantages. As I have previously mentioned equity crowdfunding seems to me to […]

I am delighted to be joined on the show today by Nigel Verdon founder and Chairman of Currency Cloud (who have always been my “Fintech insiders” Fintech of choice and have now done over $10bn of business) and also partner at OGC Capital – Anglo-Dutch VCs. On LinkedIn Nigel modestly describes himself as: “Broad range […]

On this show we have an ideal guest to guide us through “FX in the Fintech Age”. Philippe Gelis is the CEO of Kantox a B2B FX Fintech who recently passed the $1bn of business done mark. At that level you really have left any notion of “startup” far behind and are much nearer the […]

Having done a few Alternative Finance shows recently it’s important to recall that there is another hardcore Fintech sector that is already changing the world (as opposed to threatening to in the future). This is payments. One quarter of the Fintech50 are payments companies and when I looked a little while ago there were well […]

Giles and friends have really set one of the all-time Financial Services innovation high water marks with their invention of P2P – online lending and borrowing without a bank. They literally created an industry and changed the mould globally as we have seen with multi-billion$ IPOs in the US in December 2014. As they were […]

In essence the (prosaically named) “UK SME Finance Referral Scheme” basically means that soon banks wont be able to tell SMEs to bugger-off any more (which was the reality behind the prosaic (and often very slow) “loan application declined” formula).  Rather banks that turn down loan requests will need to direct SMEs to a portal(s)/alternative […]

P2P (online lending and borrowing) is plagued by media (old and new) descriptions in terms of what are often just metaphors – “P2P disintermediates banks”, “P2P directly connects borrowers and lenders” et al. Furthermore with a number of different models emerging (which isn’t always obvious to the “paying public”) it gets less relevant to say […]

Equity Crowdfunding is one of the key areas in which the UK has a great lead and so we have a special, longer than usual, episode. I am delighted to be joined on the show today by Karen Kerrigan Legal and Finance Director at Seedrs (who were the first equity crowdfunders to be FCA authorised […]

Innovation may be great but it leads to challenges – for #newFS how to get it out there (I think the “how to do it” is going well right now”).  For #oldFS the challenge is “how to absorb it”. This bridging is being done by both new and established firms. In LFP002 Warren Bond of […]

The New Year is a time of reflection, a time for looking forwards and a time to take stock. So in this light this will be a special, somewhat off-piste episode with just me at the microphone. This episode has three parts: In Part 1 I talk about some of the behind the scenes stories […]

This is a mega-episode Xmas present special for London Fintech Podcast listeners

In the hot Fintech sector there are few places hotter than being a Fintech in a 3 month accelerator program. But what are they? What’s the inside track? What works well, what is surprising and how is it all changing? Plenty of dynamics to discuss in today’s episode with Nektarios Liolios, the co-founder of Startupbootcamp […]

For me Alternative Finance is the most exciting sector in Fintech by far in terms of near term impact as competition for the “Old FS” and as choice for both borrowers and lenders. In this episode I am delighted to be joined by Christian Faes CEO of Lendinvest. In the world of Fintech froth that […]

Like a huge boulder dropped into the middle of a pond the ripples from Fintech spread far and wide and have plenty of implications, opportunities and threats for surrounding professions. Consultancy is one of these – many have become “too like” the “Old FS” sector they serve. Re-inventing this is a major opportunity. I am […]

The Economist has described the emergence of huge numbers of Fintechs as a Cambrian Explosion. Will this be followed by a Mass Extinction? I am delighted to be joined on the show today to discuss this by a uniquely qualified individual who has a background in solid BigCos, has co-founded a successful Fintech and advises […]

Alternative Finance is, in essence, Finance not provided by banks (and in a Fintech context, finance provided by “Fintechs”).  As such it is one of the sexier sectors in terms of being a direct competitor to banks.  It is an incredibly key, and an incredibly exciting sector. It’s also complex and the devil definitely lies […]

There are relatively few Fintech Founders/Co-Founders, even less that have done it for over a decade and even less that have formed two consecutive Fintechs. I am delighted to welcome such a rare individual on the show today – WIlliam Lorenz. In 2002 he co-founded Ixaris – a pre-paid VISA & MasterCard card provider which […]

I have given this episode a huuuge write-up as it’s such a vital topic. So if you don’t want to read 2,500 words, listen instead

Wisdom is massively under-rated in our data-driven society. Data, information, even knowledge can be learned.  Wisdom however has to be absorbed. Wisdom is the hard-earned distillation of decades of life experience. So in this summary today I can only scrape the surface with a precis of information and knowledge.  As always I just pick out […]