The world of trading and investing can seem daunting to beginners, with its complex terminology and ever-changing trends. However, Kwakol Markets is determined to break down these barriers by providing free educational resources through their Kwakol Market Academy. Kwakol Market Academy offers comprehensive courses, free classes, regularly updated news, e-books, and an engaging Telegram community aimed at empowering individuals to make informed investment decisions and achieve their financial goals.

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Kwakol Market Academy’s educational resources are a strong foundation for beginners and experienced traders alike. By offering comprehensive courses, free classes, regularly updated news, e-books, and a lively Telegram community, Kwakol Markets empowers individuals to build strong investment foundations and make informed decisions in the financial markets.

Whether you are just starting out or looking to enhance your trading skills, Kwakol Market Academy has the resources you need to succeed. Take advantage of these educational offerings and embark on your journey towards your financial goals by visiting their website.

The post Building Strong Foundations: Kwakol Market Academy’s Educational Resources Transform Beginners into Investors appeared first on Fintech News.

Konstantin has been working in the world of finance, trading, and technology for over a decade and has gone from CMO of one of Europe’s largest retail FX brokerages to the successful launch of several well-respected affiliate sites in the trading and iGaming environment.

Now let’s hear what he has in store with this latest venture.

FintechNews (FTN): What the heck is an investfox and how did the idea for this new site come about?

Konstantin (K): Foxes are generally clever animals and an investfox is one that knows how to navigate the investment world. Having been in the investment industry for so long I have seen too many people falling into the traps of dodgy dealings. It was while looking into why this is, that it became apparent to me that there just wasn’t a good platform out there to turn those who are just starting out in the investment world into wise investfoxes. So, using my knowledge of this sector and previous successes in this industry I decided to create a platform that would act as a helpful guide to train the average Joe citizen to be as clever as a fox when it came to dealing with the often convoluted world of investments.

FTN: So what exactly is the mission and vision of investfox?

K: Our main mission is to provide the general public with accurate information on investment companies and opportunities through unbiased expert reviews while also serving as a platform for trustworthy user feedback. I know that’s a mouth full, but our vision is simply to bring transparency and honesty to the investment industry. Simple as that.

One way we are approaching this, knowing it can be tough for people just starting out in the investment world, is by providing a wide range of educational resources to make sure that people not only know what services to use but how to use them wisely. For example, we would set out to write an article about the best Forex traders to follow, then one of our experts will spend time researching the topic, gathering data, and putting together a well-researched piece that is accessible to anyone, not just financial experts So we end up with an educational section that has plenty of value for investors at every level.

FTN: Tell us about the first thoughts that went into the development of this project.

K: Mobile-first design was a key idea from the start as mobile traffic accounts for more than half of all web traffic these days. So we made sure that our site works well on mobile devices. As our aim was to make financial information as accessible as possible to as many people as possible, our team went directly into creating content that would be translation ready. Just 6 months after the soft launch we had already managed to provide most content in English, Thai, and Indonesian.

FTN: That’s all good and well, but how does investfox differentiate itself from the masses of investment review sites that already exist?

K: Well that is simple. investfox provides a user-friendly platform for reviewing investment products and opportunities in a way that is much improved when compared to so many of the competitors. The look and feel of our site is something we spent much time focusing on, but the most important part is our focus on transparency, unbiased reviews, and honest user feedback. In my initial research, I found that so many sites were just not cutting it when it came to honesty and moderating reviews properly. Some stats have shown that 93% of customers will go and read online reviews before they decide to buy or use a product. So the need for honest and transparent reviews is a must, especially when it comes to the world of finance.

FTN: Last, but certainly not least, what can we expect from investfox going into 2023?

K: While we are constantly working to improve and expand the platform, this year should see the addition of a few more language options being added to the site. Along with that, we also plan to launch the registration section of our website which will allow users to start participating and giving their user feedback.

The post Insights from investfox founder Konstantin Rabin appeared first on Fintech News.

First and foremost, can you tell our readers a little bit about Eightcap and your current cryptocurrency offering?

Eightcap was established in 2009, in Melbourne, Australia and since then we have rapidly expanded to offer derivatives to traders worldwide. We are regulated in multiple jurisdictions allowing us to offer our products on a global scale. This includes being regulated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) and the Securities Commission of The Bahamas (SCB).  Our cryptocurrency derivatives offering is probably the most extensive within the industry, and includes altcoins, crypto-crosses and crypto indices. Our offering is always evolving and we are continuously looking at ways to add different products to our existing suite. In terms of the breadth of financial instruments we offer, we have over 1000 financial assets across Forex, Indices, Commodities, Shares and Cryptocurrency CFDs.

 What makes your cryptocurrency derivatives stand out from what exchanges are offering?

Our crypto derivatives offering appeals to the trader that wants to diversify their trading portfolio. There are products in our suite that the trader may not have considered before, or in fact, has considered but their previous provider could not offer it. Along with this is the competitive pricing, the spreads that we offer are ultra-low. For example, to trade a Bitcoin contract with us, you would be looking at anywhere between $12 – $15, this is not only cheaper than other brokerages but also mainstream exchanges too.

With Eightcap, as we are regulated to issue crypto derivatives trading (UK being the exception to this), we ensure that client funds are segregated and kept at Tier 1 banks. This provides a sense of security with retail traders who open an account with us, as their funds are held separately to our own money.

One of the main considerations when traders look to use us for their derivatives trading is the withdrawals and deposit methods. We have seen in the past couple of years where crypto investors have lost trust in their providers due to difficulties when trying to withdraw their funds. This is currently happening with the demise of FTX, with clients unable to withdraw their funds.

Another consideration is that we have various withdrawal and deposit methods available depending on where our clients are located. Our funding and withdrawal methods include PayPal, Credit/Debit Card, Bank Wire Transfer, BTC, Tether, Neteller, Skrill and more. We work on ensuring that our retail traders have a seamless experience right from the moment they open a trading account with us.

What do you think are the current challenges that are facing new entrants in the derivatives space, and how do you solve them?

 One of the main challenges new traders are faced with is a lack of knowledge around trading with margin, coupled with a lack of awareness with new instruments. For the new entrants who want to trade crypto, then it would be essential to understand the fundamental basics of the crypto market, understand how the price swings work and what affects price movements. Technical analysis and basic risk management are also key components that will better position new traders to face the market.

At Eightcap, we place education at the forefront, alongside the products we offer. With our trading account, clients will have access to a range of tiered educational resources and tools. We offer what we call TradeZone, this is a recent initiative of ours. We invite professional traders with extensive experience to be our guest analyst for the month. During this period the expert will run a series of exclusive webinars sharing tips on how to approach and place trades on a particular asset. To accompany the webinar the guest analyst will also share market insights with weekly trading commentary that is sent straight to our clients inbox.

To what extent has derivative trading increased throughout 2022, will this continue 2023?

We have seen a significant increase in the past year in the number of accounts opened, specifically for traders that have been interested in our range of crypto derivatives on offer. There has been a shift in demand from holding cryptocurrency to speculating on the market and trying to take advantage of rising and falling prices. Given the current landscape of the crypto market, I would say that we will see even more of a surge than before of investors moving over to the derivatives market to short these dropping prices.

Is there anything you recommend to new derivative traders entering the crypto market for the first time?

In addition to the points on education previously discussed, using tools that can make trading more efficient and accessible would be beneficial to new traders. Eightcap supports new traders through CryptoCrusher, a dedicated dashboard where clients receive daily crypto trade ideas. Trade ideas will include precise trade entry, target and stop levels allowing new traders to enter the crypto market with confidence. CryptoCrusher enables traders to scan the crypto markets relatively quickly by price, trend or even major highs or lows. Users will also have access to live educational resources and exclusive indicators.

It’s important for us to provide our client base with the right tools in order to make their trading experience with us the best possible.

The post Will Crypto Derivatives Continue to Meet Investor Demand in 2023? FintechNews chats to Eightcap’s CTO About the Current and Future Crypto Derivatives Landscape appeared first on Fintech News.

Leora Klapper: Financial inclusion means that households and businesses have access, and can effectively use, appropriate financial services, services that should be provided responsibly, sustainably, in a well-regulated environment.

Practically, it means that women have a safe place to keep their money outside their home. Their work is paid into an account, don’t have to travel home with a wad of cash in their pocket. They can send money home to their families in rural areas or out of the country more conveniently, affordably directly from their phone.

And then merchants paying their suppliers and accepting customer payments using a card or a phone can build a credit history to access credit on better terms, increase their inventory.

State of financial inclusion: Adults without an account receiving private sector wages in the past year (2021) in cash only. Image: Global Findex Database 2021

Financial inclusion, including access to digital financial services, is an important policy objective because it helps people manage their money better. Accounts give you greater control over your money, your financial life.

Research shows that when a woman gets an account, she builds savings, spends more on a children’s education, invests in business opportunities. In other words, having an account can offer women greater privacy, security, and control over her money.

So, for example, a recent study of a government workfare programme in India, which reached over 100 million people, found the paying women their benefits directly into their own financial institution account and not into the account of their husband or other male household head, increased woman’s financial control over her money, influenced gender norms that prevented women from working, and incentivised women to find employment compared with those women who are paid in cash. And the biggest impact was on women whose husbands had expressed the most opposition to their wife’s work.

Robin Pomeroy: So we’re talking here exclusively about women’s access to banking and financial services, or is it also sometimes men?

Leora Klapper: So we’re talking more generally about all adults having access to an account. Women, men, younger adults, older adults, certainly poorer adults.

And the benefits to having access to financial services, including accounts, credit, digital payments. However, a lot of the research, in addition to the many benefits found by all adults, having an account, the safe place to keep one’s money outside the home, could be especially beneficial to women.

Robin Pomeroy: So I’d like to ask when we talk about financial inclusion, how many people are excluded? But before we get into that, let’s talk about this thing, Findex. It says on your bio here, you’re a founder of the Global Findex Database. That’s very important to this discussion. Tell us what that is.

Leora Klapper: So since 2011, the Findex Database has measured how adults around the world save, borrow, make payments, and manage their financial risks. So our headline indicator, which is personal ownership of an account, the bank or other regulated financial institution, including mobile money accounts, has grown to 76% of adults globally, compared to just half of adults a decade ago, as recognised as a UN Sustainable Development Goal, 8.1.

So the 2021 edition, based on nationally representative surveys, we’ve got 128,000 adults and 123 economies during the COVID 19 pandemic conducted indicators on access to and use of formal and informal financial services, including these of cards, mobile phones and the internet to make and receive digital payments, including the adoption of digital merchant payments, how you buy groceries, and utility payments, how you paid your electric bills during the pandemic, plus questions on people’s financial worries and their ability to come up with emergency money.

And we started collecting the data because we were frustrated that data on things like account ownership collected directly from banks was a black box of data. We didn’t know how many women have accounts as compared to men, or how many poor adults make digital payments as compared to wealthier adults, or how many young adults are saving. But now we do. And by shining lights on these gaps on account ownership, it’s important for policymakers and practitioners to design better policies and products.

Robin Pomeroy: So give us some of those statistics again. It sounded like that was an incredible increase in the proportion of people who now are included in some type of financial services. What are the headline figures of where the world is at the moment?

Leora Klapper: So we find 76% of adults globally have an account at a bank or a financial service provider, including mobile money accounts. Those are accounts on a phone provided by a fintech or mobile money service provider. In developing countries, 71% of adults have an account – that’s more than a 30 percentage point increase since we started collecting the data a decade ago.

In developing economies, the financial inclusion increased as the share of adults making or receiving digital payments grew from 35% in 2014 to 57% in 2021. Image: Global Findex Database 2021

Robin Pomeroy: So what’s driving that trend, that increase?

Leora Klapper: So there are a lot of things that governments have done to support financial inclusion, including regulations that allow for competition from fintechs and non-bank providers like mobile money service providers. It’s also investments in infrastructure, in mobile technology, electrification, that allow the growth of agent networks, of bank agents, of mobile money agents, that allow people to access services locally, in their own home communities.

Robin Pomeroy: Is that growth coming in the poorer countries around the world?

Leora Klapper: It is. Over the past ten years, we saw a surge in accounts in some large countries, certainly in China and India. But in this round of data, the growth was more inclusive. We saw growth around the world, in Latin America, Africa and in Asia.

Robin Pomeroy: So what are the easiest things that can be done to improve financial inclusion?

Leora Klapper: Clearly, we still have a long way to go: 1.4 billion adults remain unbanked, and many adults who do have an account don’t use them. Reaching the remaining 30% won’t be easy.

And so a special feature of the Findex data is that we can ask the unbanked why they don’t have an account. A survey asked people why they’re unbanked. So only 3% of adults say the only reason they lack an account is that they don’t need one. And that really points to the massive unmet demand for financial services amongst the unbanked. If you offer them a good, affordable product that meets their needs, they might well take it.

And many countries don’t have the infrastructure like reliable electricity for payments processing and bank branches are often absent in areas where unbanked people live, and too many financial services are poorly designed and difficult to use for the neediest customers.

Many unbanked adults tell us that banking services are simply too expensive, too far away.

So one solution are digital financial services, including those provided by fintech and mobile money service providers, which leverage mobile technology and which can help mitigate the problem of physical distance between financial institutions and their customers.

So, for example, the remote areas in Asia or villages in Africa may not have a bank branch or an ATM. Most areas now have a local merchant – agents who sell not only mobile minutes for your phone, but increasingly are offering financial services. So local villagers no longer need to spend the time and the transportation costs travelling to access formal financial services.

So for example, in South Asia, we find that 240 million unbanked adults have a mobile phone. That’s more than half of the 430 million unbanked in the region. But unbanked adults frequently lack the basic tools they need to get both financial and mobile services.

One big barrier is a lack of government identification, which is commonly mentioned by the unbanked, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, where 37% of unbanked adults in the region say the lack of documentation is a reason they don’t have a financial institution account. And 30% of the unbanked face a barrier to opening a mobile money account.

“30% of the unbanked face a barrier to opening a mobile money account.”— Leora Klapper, World Bank

The Findex Database also includes data that we collect jointly with the World Bank IT for development team. We find that in sub-Saharan Africa, over 100 million adults, 16% of adults, are unbanked and have no ID.

Another really straightforward thing that governments can do is to take the lead by digitalising some of their own payments. Findex data finds about 85 million unbanked adults receive government payments in cash. That includes wages, pensions, government support transfers. And the research’s showing that for the governments shifting some of these payments to an account, it’s cheaper, it can reduce leakage and corruption. Shifting some of these payments to accounts can create an entry point for increasing accounts amongst the unbanked.

Let me give an example to illustrate. We had the pleasure to pilot the Findex questionnaire in over 30 countries around the world. And my colleague was talking to a woman in Zambia who is a schoolteacher in a rural area, and she was telling her every month she has to close the schools in the villages for two days to travel to the capital to pick up her wages. And she was complaining about the transportation costs, as well as the risk to her safety of travelling home with this wad of cash in her pocket.

And so imagine if the government digitalised that payments to the teacher. So we know from research that’s better for the government. It’s cheaper, it’s safer, it’s more likely the money actually reaches her, and can reduce corruption. It also saves the teacher transportation costs. But ultimately, the biggest impact this could have is if the teacher could be able to keep the schools open an extra day or two a month. And so we believe that financial inclusion, digitisation of payments, have broader developmental goals that can help societies.

Financial inclusion: In developing economies, 36% of adults received a payment into an account. Image: Global Findex Database 2021

Robin Pomeroy: Could you give us an idea of how those mobile technologies work? Because for people perhaps in the Western world, the richer countries, they have a bank account of the type that’s existed for generations. Maybe they’ve got online banking as part of that now, but basically they have a bank account with a bank. That’s not really what you’re talking about in some of these poorer countries where you’re talking about mobile financial services. Can you give us an idea of, for example, for that woman in Zambia, if a financial service was put in place that she could use, what do you envisage that would be?

Leora Klapper: A common model in sub-Saharan Africa is for telecoms to offer financial services. So Orange, M-PESA are examples of the leaders in Kenya, where the telecoms provide an account, often using just a simple text based phone, where people can deposit and withdraw money, using the same mobile agents which sell them their minutes.

So thinking in a rural village which doesn’t have a bank or an ATM, there is a mobile agent, often someone that the person familiar with. It might be a community member, it might be a relative they trust, deposit their money and withdraw.

We also see throughout Africa the increasing use of mobile money accounts for savings. These accounts were designed for person-to-person payments, often as a way for people working in the city to more affordably, safely and conveniently send money home to their family in rural areas. This developed into much more.

Often banks aren’t designed for the type of high-frequency, low-denomination payments that poor people make. Think about a woman who wants to save a dollar a day to pay monthly bills and wants to keep that $1 outside her home.

For example, in West Africa, we see a model called sousous. These are men who may come on a moped, home to home, to take $1 a day from, typically, a woman, to keep in a safe place. And then they return it to the woman at the end of the month, less a day’s savings. So these women are actually paying to save their money in a safe place outside their home. And we asked them, why don’t you use your bank account to save the money? And they say the bank, they would have to take a bus across town, wait in line, which isn’t feasible to do on a daily basis.

However, now they’re able to use a mobile agent on their block, which is, again, easier and costless to deposit $1 a day into their mobile money account, which is based on their phone. And they can easily, at the end of the month, withdraw their money to pay their monthly bills.

Robin Pomeroy: It sounds like there are lots of benefits to the spread of this kind of technology. Are there any drawbacks as well? Some people you question in your research don’t want to be connected to these services. Are they right in any way to be a bit nervous of doing so?

Leora Klapper: First of all, people only benefit from account ownership if they have the financial capability and confidence to use their accounts and use their accounts on their own. The Findex data finds that about a third of mobile money account holders in sub-Saharan Africa tell us they can’t use their account without the help of a family member or an agent.

It’s important to recognise that poor and financially inexperienced users may not be able to benefit from account ownership if they don’t understand how to use their account in a way that optimises the benefits but avoids the many consumer protection risks, such as high-end hidden fees, overindebtedness, fraud, and discrimination. And so policymakers need to make sure the regulations keep pace with these digital innovations, ensure that things like that don’t happen. Otherwise, people will distrust digital financial services, and these development opportunities could be lost.

Robin Pomeroy: In terms of the costs. You talk about people crossing town, queuing up to deposit money in an actual physical bank, but banks charge fees and presumably these mobile operators charge fees. Do you have some idea of what the cost is to that woman in Zambia deciding or being enabled to receive her salary through some kind of financial service? What what is the cost there, and is that a significant barrier as well?

Leora Klapper: So costs vary widely by country and by product. Often there are costs to opening and maintaining a bank account. Mobile money services, again, they were created and designed for payments. So typically the fee might be on the payment or on the withdrawal of the money, but typically it’s lower to maintain and operate a mobile money account than a bank account.

And there’s also, again, the tremendous convenience of having the services locally. For example, we’ve been doing some work looking at the use of fintechs to send international remittances home. So workers working in high-income countries are sending money home to developing countries, in Asia, for example. And there’s been a lot of research showing that the costs are often much cheaper if workers can send the money directly from their own firms themselves rather than through a bank or a money transfer operator.

Robin Pomeroy: Just one thing on the tech, then. If you’ve got money on your phone somehow, is there some way to actually take it out in cash if you’re living in a rural area in Africa, say, or does it just stay on the phone and you’re making payments through your phone?

Leora Klapper: No, absolutely. So the mobile money operator has all of the money in a deposit account in a regulated financial institution, and you can withdraw money anytime from your local mobile agent. So effectively, the mobile agents who would sell you your minutes for your phone to make calls and texts are now also providing financial services by taking deposits and by making withdrawals.

Robin Pomeroy: So that mobile technology has been around for a fair while now, hasn’t it? Could you give us an idea of when that started to come in? And then, are there new technologies? Everyone talks about blockchain and this kind of thing. Is any of that thing going to help or are we better relying on what now is a fairly well-established, fairly low tech solution?

Leora Klapper: We say how in Findex we are asking questions about technology that wasn’t invented and dreamed up 10 years ago when we started the survey. Certainly there have been many technological innovations, especially to keep the money safer. But, you know, in sub-Saharan Africa, we’re really seeing simply the tech space, technology on mobile phone, really exploding, especially over the COVID period.

So we now find that 33% of adults in sub-Saharan Africa have a mobile money account and are using their accounts for more than just payments, using accounts to save and to borrow. But increasingly, as more and more adults have smartphones, internet-enabled phones, it allows for them to access a greater array of financial services.

Robin Pomeroy: What can we say has been the impact of COVID? You’ve mentioned that a couple of times.

Leora Klapper: So it’s important to remember that 2021, when we collected the data, was not an ordinary year. And so we heard all about during the first year of the pandemic about ways in which digital technology enabled people, especially in wealthier countries, to quickly pivot to hybrid work and leverage digital channels to conduct everyday business, for example, by ordering groceries or kerbside delivery.

The many social distancing and mobility restrictions, along with the perception that cash was unsanitary, really accelerated the shift towards the digitalisation of payments.

And so the Findex Data allowed us to quantify what the digital acceleration looked like for people in developing countries. They were able to leverage digital financial services for the very first time.

So, for example, Latin America and the Caribbean, countries that before the pandemic had the digital infrastructure and really the digital readiness to accelerate, but there were challenges around the costs of digital financial services, business formalisation, taxation. We found that during the pandemic, 40% of adults told us they made a digital merchant payments, including 14% of adults who made their first merchant payment, bought their groceries using a card or a phone for the very first time during the pandemic.

The surprise isn’t that it happened, the surprise is how quickly it happened.

We also heard that about one-third of adults in developing countries who paid a utility bill, a water, trash or electric bill directly from their account, did so for the first time after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Further evidence in the role of the pandemic in accelerating digital payments adoption.

So why does this matter? So, for example, I talked to a woman in peri-urban India who every month paid 50 rupees for a bus ride to the city to pay a 300 rupee electric bill. So digital financial services could save her both the time and the money.

Robin Pomeroy: We’ve talked about the developing world a lot here. Does your research also encompass richer countries? And can we talk a little bit about what you found there?

Leora Klapper: It does. So in high-income countries, almost all adults report making and receiving digital payments. It’s ubiquitous in our society. Where we really saw this tremendous adoption and growth was the developing countries catching up during COVID. However, we still see gaps in developed countries, especially around frequency of savings, as well as challenges amongst poorer adults in accessing financial services.

Robin Pomeroy: So is that something that’s improving, poorer communities having bad access to financial services? Are we seeing this kind of positive trend that you’re seeing globally in those parts of the world as well?

Leora Klapper: Yes, we have seen many of the gaps close, but we still find, for example, in countries that have histories of hyperinflation, adults being wary to keep their money in the bank. We also see in some countries issues around trust in the banking sector, in countries that have had episodes of bank crises.

People will only use banking services if they trust that their money is safe in the bank, that they trust that when they make a payment, the money will be received. And that’s why it’s so important to have strongly enforced consumer protection, to make sure there isn’t financial fraud and abuse and that trust in banks remains high, even in high-income countries.

Robin Pomeroy: Could you tell us something about yourself? Why is this such an important issue to you personally?

Leora Klapper: I’ve travelled the world speaking to people about their financial lives, making sure that we’re asking the right questions, and you continuously hear how important it is for all adults to have a safe place to keep their money.

So, for example, I’ll never forget in rural India, where we met a small group of women who had banded together to pool their very small savings and were able to get a small microfinance loan to purchase a small hand-held meat grinder, looking like a coffee machine, a coffee grinder. And they charged people in the neighbouring areas to use it. And they had saved the small portion of their very tiny profits to hire the first teacher to travel to their village to teach their daughters to read.

And these are the type of access to basic financial services, like saving accounts and credit, that can support the millions of women around the world who have these idea and dreams to help their families and communities.

Most of my research looks at what are the real benefits of digital payments on the users. Is it more than just a convenience?

So for example, we designed a study to measure the impact of paying factory workers in Bangladesh, mostly women, directly into an account as compared to workers who opened accounts but received their wages in cash. Speaking to a worker, the woman told us that when she was paid in cash, her mother-in-law would literally wait outside the gate for her on payday. But now she can’t. Paying her directly into an account gives her privacy, security and more control over her money.

Research finds that factory workers paid into an account are more likely to save and less likely to make impulse purchases. These workers were also better able to manage health emergencies and other unexpected expenses. And quite importantly, over time, these workers learnt to better use financial services without help by avoiding extra agent fees. In other words, they became savvier financial customers.

This is consistent with research that shows, for example, that women with accounts have more say over household budget decisions and spending. So a study in the Philippines shows a household where women have their own accounts are more likely to buy a washing machine and other household goods that might benefit them more.

Robin Pomeroy: This survey was done in 2021. When’s the next one and what do you expect to see by the time you do this one again?

Leora Klapper: So one of the exciting, surprising findings in the data was this large adoption of digital payments. But the world has reopened. In my own neighbourhood, where I grew up in Queens, the Italian bakery, who only accepted cash in July 2020, installed their first POS terminal to accept digital payments as people were afraid to use cash. And then I was home this summer and saw a large sign in the window ‘We only accept cash!’

And so the question will be, will this adoption, the rapid digitisation of payments, continue when the world reopens? And it will if both the sellers and the users see the benefits, if the merchants who are accepting digital payments have the opportunities to use their payments history to access better credit terms. Whether the benefits outweigh the costs. And that will only happen if these services are provided in a safe environment.

Our next survey will hopefully be in 2024.

Robin Pomeroy: Where do people go if they want to find out more about this issue and more about the Findex database?

Leora Klapper: So there’s a lot of data at globalfindex.worldbank.org. We have data for 123 countries plus all of our analysis.

Link: https://getpocket.com/es/my-list/tags/fintech

Source: https://getpocket.com

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Abraham, with a whopping £6m ($8m) raised in this funding round, what’s next for Timeline?

Growth, growth and more growth. Since Timeline launched in 2018, we’ve grown at an incredible rate. With the addition of our MPS, Betafolio, which has amassed almost £1bn in AUM in just over 2 years, now the big numbers are truly in sight. We’re on a mission to help 10 million people face their financial future with confidence. And we’re doing that by tearing up the dusty old tech stack IFAs have been lumped with for decades, and replacing it with something far better.

Will Timeline and Betafolio make an adviser-free future possible?

Quite the opposite, frankly. Robo-advisers and the like have one missing ingredient – that human relationship. That’s what makes advisers so important. Timeline and Betafolio could never replace the adviser-client relationship – and we don’t want to. But what we can do is clear a path through all the outdated tech, unfriendly user interfaces, and time-intensive day to day tasks that drain the advisers’ time. We’re clearing the way for our IFA partners to build unrivalled customer service levels for their clients. And, of course, service more clients too.

How will Timeline improve the lives of IFAs?

We already have. Timeline puts the likes of digital fact finds, risk profiling, cashflow modelling, and investment analytics at an IFA’s fingertips. Tasks that take hours, and bog client meetings down in admin, are reduced to a few mouse clicks. And with our range of low-cost model portfolios, advised clients can enjoy secure, long term investment returns. Plus, we’re helping adviser to keep the costs low for themselves and their clients through great tech across the board. We’re already closing in on £1billion in invested assets since our 2020 launch. That tells me we’re doing something right.

With investment from the likes of MTech Capital, and influential players like FNZ and Darren Carter from Peel Hunt, do you think this is a tipping point for Timeline?

The big names are really noticing us now, and putting their money where their mouth is. FNZ were actually one of the first to invest in us eighteen months ago. They can’t believe the progress we’ve made since then. They see the huge potential for penetrating this under-served market that comes when you offer a far better customer experience, alongside lower costs. We’re all on the same page too – we want to open up wealth management, make it more accessible to more people.

Talking about opening up access, do you think the advice gap can be tackled by technology?

Put it this way, in the UK, only 7% of people engage a financial adviser, for reasons like cost, and lack of access. We can’t bridge that gap alone, but in partnership with IFAs, we’re going to change the game for everyone. Our tech enables advisers to service more clients, lower cost barriers, and boost client engagement through clear graphs and projections. Timeline is the perfect tool for IFAs to tackle the advice gap head on, and it’s going to be an exciting few years for clients and advisers alike.

Any final words?

To any advisers reading this, we made Timeline and Betafolio specifically for you. These aren’t direct to client applications. For all our tech talk and digital innovation, we couldn’t exist without you. And we know that by the end of your free Timeline trial, you’ll feel the same about us.

Abraham Okusanya is the founder and CEO of Timeline.

The post After raising £6m in funding, Timeline’s Abraham Okusanya lays out his vision for revolutionising financial adviser tech. appeared first on Fintech News.

José Luís Almazán Palomino is the CEO of Ocean Infrastructures Management, Managing Partner of Ocean Capital Partners Group and Vice President of the Spanish Association of Port Investors.

The profile stands out for three reasons. He is a port businessman, executive, manager and investor of port assets. In his professional career, his expertise for twenty years in the port sector makes José Luís Almazán Palomino a great personality in the sector managing assets with a value of 1 billion € . He is Managing Partner of the Ocean Capital Partners Group, one of the Spanish business groups with a long history and family-run business in the port engineering sector. Ocean Capital Partners has developed expertise with fifty years in the national and international market work, this makes them leaders and flag bearers in investment financial consulting and port asset management.

The business group carries out projects and operations that reach 1,000 million euros. Its businesses, through concessions, are the management, exploitation and promotion of marinas, container and passenger terminals. The latest project of José Luís Almazán Palomino the marina of the Port of Malaga has been recognized for its sustainability with an international award “Tourism Excellence” in Fitur. In addition, they have just been granted the management of a new marina in the Malaga port of San Andrés through its partners in the Qatar fund Al Alfia and the American group IGY.

You are a businessman, executive, investor and port asset manager. How have you grown professionally from your initial days and now as a port asset manager, investor and how has your journey been so far?

I have been linked to the port sector all my life. In 2003 I started working as general manager in a port authority for the Spanish public administration. Ten years later, in 2013, I made the leap to the private sector and since then I have been managing port assets. I started as a consultant working for the infrastructure fund, Queensland Investment Corporation, an Australian pension infrastructure fund that we still represent in Spain.

QIC is an Australian state of Queensland fund from which we bought a significant percentage of one of the world’s leading container terminal operators. Over the years we started to see some investment opportunities in assets that QIC had no interest in and we thought it made sense to invest in. So, we looked at investing outside QIC with our own resources, together with our partners and some investors who invest jointly with us.

In this way, we began to invest in other types of assets, specifically in passenger terminals and marinas, which is where our focus is now. We have been doing this investment work through Ocean Capital Partners since 2013.

In the Ocean Capital Partners group of companies, how does the process of investing in port assets work?

We work with two options, organic and inorganic growth. One of the things we do the most are tenders issued by the public administration to invest and manage a port asset for a period of time. It is a tender where a bid is presented with the technical capacity, the economic solvency, the management and investment project, and the creation of value for the environment of the project in that tender. And it is the port authority that decides which project is the most interesting to develop, both in terms of value creation and in terms of having the best chances of success in the area. Another of the factors that the port authority also values when selecting projects is the most solid business model, the one that contributes most to the payment of fees compared to the rest of the candidates, and the project that makes the most sense, compared to the rest of the projects.

Once the competition is launched, one of the things we do in our company, Ocean Capital Partners, is to look for the right partners. If we see that it makes sense and it is a project that we are interested in and that we can present a winning project, we look for the right partners, we look for the resources, we structure the financing, we do the project, the study, the financial models and finally we present it.

If we are fortunate enough to present the best offer and if we are awarded the contract, we create the appropriate company, we structure the financing, we award the works, we do all the project management, we finish the works, we hire the teams and we put the port asset to work and manage it with its teams. This is the main part of what we do. And then we stay behind the port asset, helping and accompanying the management team, serving in the company through the board of directors and the management committee of each of the companies.

As a professional in the investment sector, how do you perceive the investment market currently at a national and international level?

The maritime port logistics sector, in general, has become extremely attractive in recent months, but it has many challenges. There have been huge changes due to the impact of Covid.  First of all, in the passenger terminals, we have had a very big impact, we have investments in some terminals with traffic to Morocco where the border has been closed for two years, so the impact has been enormous. But in the logistics sector in general, the process of vertical integration of the shipping companies has accelerated the process of concentration, and we are seeing how the fact that there has been less supply for some time has caused skyrocketing prices of. The process of concentration, vertical integration and change that was expected to take place in fifteen years, is happening in fifteen months. The occurrence has been observed among all the intermediaries, the “free for orders”, the cargo considerers, are changing, this means that the shipping lines are gaining a lot of weight and there are many operations and acquisitions.

There is a change in the sector in general. It is a good moment for the logistics sector, for the shipping lines, but it is a complicated time for the terminals, depending on the case. Like everything else, it is a time of change in which the paradigm of the sector is shifting. It is no longer the way it was a year ago and, like everything else, there are companies that are suffering a lot and have fewer opportunities. It is a time of change that represents a challenge, a risk, but also an opportunity.

What are the most important professional projects that you have worked upon?

We made investments and divestments in a global operator, Group Maritime TCB, of a container terminal whose shareholder was the Australian pension fund QIC, of which we bought 40% of the company together with another Portuguese fund, Finpro. The company had terminals in Spain, Turkey, Latin America, in several countries and we were working on to increase the scale of the company, helping it, accompany the sale process of the majority shareholder. We sold the company to the Danish group APM Terminals linked to Maersk. The project was worth 900 million euros, was at the time, the first and most relevant operations in the port sector. This was in 2015 in the process of vertical integration and consolidation of the maritime port sector. Then on a personal basis, from our company, Ocean Capital Partners, we have invested in the passenger terminal in Malaga, wherein this project we worked on the concession of the terminal and the licenses with a local partner, a well-known Andalusian businessman, Domingo Torres and with a shipping company, also a partner of ours, as well as our investment in the passenger terminal in Algeciras with one of the main operators. Moreover, we are also closely associated to the mega-yacht project in Malaga. In the yacht sector we have collaborated through a Qatari fund in the mega yacht marina in Barcelona, to later run different projects in Spain. We were also fortunate enough to win a project for a port in Mallorca, Balearic Islands, which is a very interesting place. And two years ago, we got a project to build and develop a mega-yacht marina in Malaga. This is a project we develop with our American partners IGY, and is currently in progress, having a great potential in the near future. IGY linked to the world’s leading mega-yacht marina called Island Global Yachting, which operates in New York, Miami, the Caribbean, and in Europe, London, Sete in France and Puerto Cervo in Sardinia. They are the main operator of mega yatch marinas in the world with 5000 mega-yachts associated, most of them doing the Caribbean and Mediterranean transit every year, 3, 500 are clients of this platform. It is the benchmark that we have set in the world. We have partnered exclusively to carry out projects in Spain and this project in Malaga is, for the moment, the one we have developed together up to date. We are looking at many other projects.

Due to the current situation, do you now have to invest more in supply chains to make them more resistant?

What is happening is that this Covid situation has accelerated the process. Which was expected to take 10 to 15 years, the pandemic has accelerated it by 15 months. There is a major concentration of cargoes in the shipping companies. In addition, there is another issue, goods have to be sent door to door rather than port to port, which means that integrated logistics chains are fundamental. We are also seeing a paradigm shift along with use of all the disruptive technology, which has reached the world of infrastructures and logistics chains where, in the end, the one who has the power is the one who has the platform for interaction with the end customer. Let’s say it’s the platforms like Amazon. The person who has that interaction platform is the one who has the capacity to reach the customer, the one who has the power of the end customer’s data.

In the end, we are seeing how all these operations are looking for fully integrated and competitive logistics chains. There is a very relevant fact which is that all institutional investors are the ones investing in logistics infrastructure, but also in the end customers and one of the issues in which they also care & invest is the environment.

How important are Environmental, Social and Governance, ESG, issues? 

ESG issues are fundamental, they are being demanded by the institutional client and also by the end customer. The logistics chains are also going to compete in terms of CO2 emissions capacity .We are seeing how the logistics chains measure the carbon footprint and how this is an element for the end customer to decide whether their product goes one way or another and this environmental sensitivity is another element to take into account that will undoubtedly influence competition in the logistics chains.

What volumes of capital do you manage through the QIC fund and through the projects with Ocean Infrastructures Management operations?

The Queensland Investment Corporation, QIC, fund is of value 92 billion AUD, although we are in the fund managing the infrastructure segment which is about 2800 billion AUD, approximately. We have been managing assets worth one billion euros, part of which we have diversified. We work with deals from 100 million to 1 billion. And now, we invest our own money in deals of all sizes. We are doing smaller operations from 10 million up to 100 € million. In relation to the parameters, the QIC fund is 92 billion AUD, the QIC infrastructures is 2800 million and we have been managing assets of 1billion euros with a reduced team of 200 employees.

What type of portfolios do you work with through the Queensland Investment Corporation fund?

Queensland is a fund with 92 billion Australian dollars in assets. The Anglo-Saxon model is quite different from Spanish model. Here pension funds invest in government bonds in Spain but in Australia, they can invest in infrastructure.  QIC is a pension fund belonging to the pensioners in the state of Queensland. It is a sovereign wealth fund that has a division or section that invests in infrastructure. It invests in toll roads, airports, car parks, water companies, gas terminals and ports. And at Ocean Capital Partners, we have been running this fund in Spain since 2013, from which we have generated several operations in ports. The objective is to invest in the very long term, the longer the better.

How is the sector financed?

Here the way of financing is Project Finance. They are infrastructures, they are long-term concessions where you have a physical infrastructure that can be mortgaged and with a reasonably predictable cash flow generation, so the economical and feasible way to do it in the port world is to do Project Finance. It is financing where the collateral is the asset itself, the concession that you have, can be mortgaged. As I said, in Europe the interest rates are very competitive, extraordinarily competitive, and with an equity debt financing percentage are of 65%.

What are the main services provided by your companies?

We have a company called Ocean Infrastructures Management which is one of the leading companies in Global Marine Port Consultancy. We work in the port industry and we are solely, exclusively dedicated to the port sector. Our company is the only company that works entirely in the port sector. Within the port sector, we operate upon the whole chain of port services providing 360 degree services. We have a very experienced and capable technical team that is currently working on a lot of projects in Spain, the Middle East, Dubai and Saudi Arabia, which includes the project for the port in the new city of Neon. We are working also for multiple international clients, like the World Bank, and with Ibero American clients. We are the benchmarking company that works in the port sector. We work mainly in Spain with private clients, about 90% are private clients, and we are working in several projects in Latin America, around 30% of our team are there.

What kind of services does the Ocean Capital Partners Group offer?

We work a lot for banks, investors, financiers, investment funds, we do everything from technical due diligence, strategic advisory, planning, to purely technical engineering projects, port detailing, and project management. We currently are doing project management for a few port projects also. Our team also accomplishes a lot of financing, we arrange a lot of funds to purchase port assets, working in the field of Mergers and Acquisitions.

I have done a lot of well-known projects in the port sector of mergers and acquisitions of sale and purchase linked to the world of funds, the world of port operators, we also do a lot of environmental analysis and studies. We do the whole value chain through Ocean Infrastructures Management. So, we are very much aware of what interesting opportunities there are for investments in port projects, and of who the potential investors could be, and to select the most appropriate operators, and the best industrial partners. And when we detect a product that we think makes sense, we bet for that product, we look for the industrial partner that we think will be suitable, that will accompany us or others in the project. We look for the investment partner, we prepare the whole package with the company, Ocean Infrastructures Management, and sometimes through Ocean Capital Partners, we also contribute by investing in capital and also have our management capabilities to accompany the board and the management team.

What is the key to your business?

The key to our business is our team. We have the best talents, in our company. Here in our companies, we always take the top graduates at college. We have brilliant people in the company who then go through a training process and furthermore, they do an MBA. In our companies, we combine technical skills with financial and management skills along with hyper-specialization within the ports sector.

In fact, we don’t do everything, we only do one type of things. Our strong point is that we work in the port sector. In the port sector, we have the expertise to work with the best talent. We invest a lot of time and resources to hire the best talent and align people with our purpose. Hence, we try to create value in our port projects, covering all needed aspects, from feasibility studies, to technical design project management, financing, management, merges and acquisitions, always in the port sector, which I have to say is quite large.

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Dmitry Tsyplakov: Five to eight years ago, no one understood the difference between a product manager and a marketer or a project manager. Now I explain it this way: a product manager is responsible for three metrics on the IT side – the happiness of the user, the business, and the team. This is a person who has no one to report to, but tries to steer the three conflicting parties in the right direction.

The product manager uses analytics, product research and approaches. He knows what CJM, GTD, Agile methodology, and unit economics are. You could say that a product manager is a mini-CEO within the product and its IT component. Such a specialist can work in construction or any offline business, but most often product managers are needed in the IT sphere.

A product manager must have an incredible desire to influence the product and receive feedback. It’s the ability to be a leader and a real boss in the way of adversity, when development resources and money are lacking, when users aren’t happy. This is the kind of uncomfortable story you need to make decisions in. These have to be informed decisions based on data and dry statistics

What is the role of the PM in the company?

D.T.: The product manager plays a critical role in the structure of a company. The recent popularity of the profession of product manager is due to the fact that the concept of product creation has changed. Previously, companies preferred to develop in a completely isolated mode, consumers learned about a new product only when it appeared on the market. The approach I stick to is when company comes out with a minimal viable product (MVP), evaluates in real terms the potential demand for it, and develops it based on feedback from users.

This approach requires constant and professional attention to the product by the company. This is what determined the emergence of a specialist whose activity and area of responsibility is entirely devoted to the product. 

Should PM have a technical background?

D.T.: I personally don’t have to have a Tech degree but  as a PM I define the ideology of the product development process. The work is well-organized when developers understand what they are doing and why, and the product manager considers their limitations.  A product manager should be able to negotiate, persuade, motivate the team, while understanding the work process.

What qualities should a beginner PM have in order to create new products and bring them to market? 

D.T.: In my opinion, the 3 main skills of a product manager for successful work. I would highlight: strategic thinking, planning, building communications. Let me elaborate on this point. 

1. Strategic thinking. The product manager is responsible for the creation of the product, its release to the market and the duration of its life cycle. Therefore he needs to constantly analyze product performance, user needs and think about how to improve the product. Even before creating a product, the manager must understand its place in the niche. In order for the product to live on the market for a long time and bring profit, it has to be superior to the competition. During the testing and implementation phases, it is important for the manager to gather feedback and promptly refine the product.
2. Planning. Usually they set a certain timeframe for the launch of the product and set a deadline. In order to have time to finish and think everything over, the product must be able to plan, distribute work in the team and control its fulfillment.
3. Building communication. Effective communication is the key to successful and problem-free work on the project. Different situations can arise in the team, and it is necessary to be able to find a way out of them. It is good if the product manager has a degree in psychology or is interested in psychology. This will help them find a common language with the team, management, contractors, and colleagues from other departments.

How would you advise newbies to expand their expertise?

D.T.: Practical experience is the best way to become a true professional. Besides that, I recommend joining different professional communities. I am a member of the Product Coalition community for product managers. It’s the largest networking platform for PMs. Membership helps me expand my network and share experiences with colleagues. It’s important for a professional to be surrounded by passionate about product people, to exchange insights about product strategies and product delivery.

What projects did you run as a product manager and what are you doing now?

D.T.: My career journey started at the age of 18 when I founded a game studio. Our team first in Russia had received a license from Sony to develop the software and a year later first users saw the Dino Games. Then I launched the Futbalito app — youth football aggregator with data, statistics and analytics for business participants. On a side with a sports application I received an order to make community platform for networking in the modelling business, which quickly became popular in Europe, owing to a partnership with Fashion TV and the top influencers. Managing products in different business areas is always a challenge. Operating with new audiences, promotion channels, and various product roadmaps taught me how to quickly adapt to changes and organize a team for productive cooperation. At the moment i’m launching a real estate project in California. 

Dmitry Tsyplakov, Serial Entrepreneur/Digital Product Manager/ PropTech/ Blockchain.

The post What Makes a Good Digital Product Manager? A Beginner’s Guide. appeared first on Fintech News.

As Herman Man, Chief Product Officer at BlueVine, puts it, users are willing to forgive the odd UI glitch on a consumer app — but never in a financial product. You don’t mess with the user’s money.

That said, competitive financial institutions — and the technology companies that power their increasingly digital services — must constantly innovate to retain relevance in the market. There is always some hot new startup crashing into finance, claiming to be the next great industry disruptor.

Read the full article

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In an interview with Kara Swisher Tuesday at the annual invite-only Code Conference in Beverly Hills, California, Elon Musk argued global governments should steer clear of trying to regulate Bitcoin and cryptocurrency.

“It is not possible to, I think, destroy crypto, but it is possible for governments to slow down its advancement,” Musk said during his red-chair interview.

Read full interview

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