Ep. 277. News: Sons of Breaches

Our hosts Simon and Ryan are joined by Menno van Leeuwen, Head of Business & Customer Development at Moneyou, Guy Stiebel, VP Products at SCANOVATE and Paul Stamper, Head of Financial Services, Ipsos MORI.

First up, all the misinformation in the world. Monzo attacked for lending customers money to buy its shares. Monzo, has been accused of “going beyond the pale” by allowing its customers to get into debt to buy its shares. As discussed on last week’s show, Monzo is aiming to raise £20 million through crowdfunding. The prospectus shows that it will allow eligible customers to go overdrawn by up to £1,000 to buy shares.

Brexcellent preparations. As things stand regarding Brexit, banks and others will need bases in the EU27. Danièle Nouy, the head of the supervisory arm of the European Central Bank (ECB), said recently that 37 firms, including 25 banks, had secured new or improved licences or were close to doing so. ECB is insisting that banks set up more than mere “empty shells” and wants banks to avoid being “overly reliant” on “back-to-back” hedging strategies.

Scoring, for generation rent. Rental payments now show on your Experian Credit Report. Experian Credit Reports now include the rental payment information of more than 1.2 million tenants from across the UK. Adding rental data to credit reports means 45% more tenants will be able prove their identity online and are more likely to have increased access to financial products.

Licence to bank. P2P lender Zopa granted full UK banking licence. Zopa, the 13-year-old peer-to-peer lender, has become the first of its kind to be awarded a full UK banking licence. The new bank will allow Zopa to increase its offerings with a new fixed-term savings account and credit card. Also expected to roll out a new money management app.

We spoke to Zopa CEO Jaidev Janardana to get a closer look at what their plans are now they have a full UK banking licence.

Line into banking. Line crosses into banking with Mizuho tie-up. Line will launch digital banking services by 2020 in collaboration with Mizuho Financial Group, aiming to break into the sector using its domestic user base of 78 million.
Initially, the venture with Mizuho will let users remit small sums by smartphone and offer small loans for that purpose.

We spoke to our very own APAC insider, Brandon Chung to get more of an insight into what this means.

Not quite 5 star service. Card details at risk in massive Marriott data breach. The details of millions of payment cards may have been exposed in a hack on hotel giant Marriott affecting 500 million guests. Guest reservations database of its Starwood unit has been compromised since 2014. For 327 million, the compromised information includes some combination of name, mailing address, phone number, email address, passport number, date of birth, gender, arrival and departure information, reservation date, and communication preferences.

Contactless charity. London installs network of contactless donation points to help the homeless. Londoners can now make contactless donations to homelessness charities through a network of terminals across the city. The TAP donation points have so far been installed in 35 locations across London, with more than 90 to appear across the capital this winter. Each tap of the card on the terminal deducts a £3 donation, which will be split between the 22 charities comprising the London Homeless Charities Group.

And Finally…

A rat’s gotta eat. A rat broke into an ATM, ate nearly $20,000 worth of cash, died. A rat in Assam state, India, squeezed its way inside an ATM machine, consumed and destroyed $17,662 worth of Rupees, and promptly died. When technicians attended the ATM they found looked like the contents of a paper shredder, with the rat already dead and buried within the mountain of minced up money. No foul play is suspected.

All this and so much more on today's episode of Fintech Insider!
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This week's episode was produced by Laura Watkins, written by Dhanum Nursigadoo and edited by Alex Woodhouse.

Special Guests: Brandon Chung, Guy Stiebel, Jaidev Janardana, Menno van Leeuwen, Paul Stamper, and Ryan Garner.