Beiträge

Cash HAS a future, as it seems. Interesting research by Pymts.com

Source: Cash Product Office

Source: Cash Product Office

Traveling the world I have seen that what many predict – the cash-less society – feels like it is very, very far away. A prime example for me is Sweden and the discussion that they possibly want to get rid of cash altogether within short. Not going to happen. When you are outside the bigger cities, hardly any small store likes you to pay by card. Mobile wallets are not to be found. It is the culture to have little markets and community cafés and when you try to pay your coffee and cinnamon bun with anything but cash they tell you where the next ATM is (in such cases usually some 30km away).

The more interesting I found this article by Pymnts.com, titled „With Millennials Picking Cash Over Cards, Cash Gains Steam“. Their research shows that while one would expect that older folks would use more cash, the exact opposite is the case. Worth mentioning is that the cash seems to be used mostly for small transactions while bigger ones are paid with cards – to keep the amount of change in your pocket in check. All this makes much sense to me – great read.

Could new payments authentication rules scupper European Digital Single Market?

Peter Bayley, EVP Risk Management at Visa, asked this question on Politico. This is about the plans of the EU Commission to enforce strong user authentication for payments transactions with PSD 2. Its a great read and shows good alternative paths, which do not cause frustration and additional steps for the consumer. While this is sponsored content (and I guess it is sponsored by Visa), I still believe it is very relevant in the discussion.

Infographic: FinTech Outlook 2016

Call Levels has published an interesting outlook for FinTech in 2016 with the intriguing head-line „20 Amazing Facts You Need To Know About FinTech“. Its pretty high level – but very interesting nevertheless. Worth spending these 20 seconds for sure.

Fintech Industry Outlook 2016

@Credits: Call Levels

EU is getting serious with Payment Service Directive 2 (PSD2)

I am curious what will actually result from this. Will the EU be right and make it easier for new business models, allowing a better, cheaper, more consumer focussed payments market in Europe? Or will it create a large number of „skins“ on existing business models – fancy looking front-end based on the same old back-end the banks have relied on for so long? And when so many new players will have it easy to enter the market-space, will that make things better for the consumers? Or more irritating and confusing? I am not convinced that the PSD2 will actually make things better – or cheaper. Only different. It will force traditional players to re-think their business models. Also I am not sure that opening access to bank accounts (or transaction accounts of other form) to new players, basically allowing them to tap into expensive infrastructure and relationships built over long time and with large budgets, is a good idea necessarily. That much I have learned in my life: there is no such thing as „free“, there is a price. And its going to be paid somehow, by someone. I suspect it will be the consumer – as its always been – just maybe in a different way, through increased account fees for instance. Like interchange regulation in various markets have made the transactions cheaper (for the merchants), the goods no cheaper to buy (for the consumers) but the annual fees for card-holders much higher. Well, we shall see.

EU Parliament Press Release about PSD2

Buch „Marktplätze“ mit lesenswertem Autoren-Beitrag von mir

marktplätzeAlle Branchen befinden sich derzeit in derselben Situation: Unternehmen bedienen ihre Kunden oft noch über konventionelle Kanäle, obwohl viel mehr Kenntnis und Erreichbarkeit vorhanden ist. Technisch ist es möglich, den Ort des Kunden zu bestimmen, die Situation, in der er sich befindet. Mit diesem Wissen kann man reagieren: personalisiert können Leistungen des Unternehmens angeboten werden, die zu den Bedürfnissen des K
unden passen. Wenn das Unternehmen dies nicht tut, wird das Geschäft von anderen Playern im Markt abgegraben. Vertriebskanäle werden zunehmend bei Partnern etabliert, auch um gebündelte Produkte anzubieten. Es entstehen Orchestrierung und Kollaboration, und das Social Business reagiert viel stärker auf die Meinung der Kunden zum Produkt.