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I'm generally a believer that consumer-focused regulation – if well thought-out – is good for nascent tech spaces. Proactive regulators are more likely to set forward-thinking rules that facilitate innovation while preventing significant harms. Responsive regulations that only come after harms have been realized are much more likely to quell innovation.

And regs in a sense legitimizes the technology they address, opening it up to larger, more institutional customers. That is why you see the two far ends of the crypto spectrum – the hardcore self-custody 'sovereign citizens' and the stridently anti-crypto SEC – both opposed to a bill that the US House passed this week, which could finally provide a roadmap to regulate and allow a flourishing digital asset economy in the US.

In related news at TWIF, our great Policy section editor Mohammad is moving on to his next big adventure, leaving a policy-shaped hole in our hearts here. If you know any great writers who would want to work with This Week in Fintech (on policy or other topics), please reach out!

Sharing his note below:

If you missed it, in our latest Fintech OG Series this week, Julie interviewed Commerce Ventures founder Dan Rosen and Citi Ventures MD Luis Valdich:

🎧The Fintech OG Series: Dan Rosen and Luis Valdich

Welcome back for the next episode of the Fintech OG series! This week I’m excited to have Dan Rosen of Commerce Ventures and Luis Valdich of Citi Ventures on the podcast. Beyond their professional insights, both of them offered candid reflections on personal growth over their 10+ years in the

This Week in FintechJulie VerHage-Greenberg

Please enjoy another week of fintech and banking news below. (👍👎 Have feedback for us? Let us know!)

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💬 Quote of the Week

🏦 Financial Services & Banking

📰 Other News

The US House of Representatives passed a landmark crypto regulation bill, winning broad bipartisan support from both parties, that now goes to the Senate. The law would create a tailored disclosure and registration regime for digital-asset companies, and grant primary responsibility for regulating the industry to the CFTC at the expense of the SEC (leading SEC chair Gary Gensler to oppose the bill), which could open digital currencies to more financial services institutions. It remains to be seen whether the Senate now ratifies the bill. Ripple is also contributing $25 million to Fairshake, a federal super political action committee backing pro-crypto candidates in the 2024 US elections.

The US Federal Reserve is rolling back a proposed 20% mandated increase in reserve capital for the nation's biggest banks, to shore up their core capital requirements, after significant lobbying from JP Morgan and other bulge-bracket banks.

In an interesting wrinkle, Numisma Bank, an uninsured currency transaction bank that was just established (and backed by former Fed vice chair for supervision Randal Quarles), won approval for a Fed master account – surprising some in the industry because many other nontraditional banks have been waiting for months or years for master account access.

The CFPB is taking on many ambitious new projects these days – this week announcing that it plans to look into the lack of competition in consumer credit reporting, credit-scoring, and mortgage closing costs from the big three bureaus Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion.

Spanish bank BBVA and OpenAI are bringing its ChatGPT conversational AI tool to employees to use.

Hong Kong launched a new pilot program to test out the Chinese central bank's digital yuan for retail purchases and cross-border payments.

Goldman Sachs obtained a license to set up a regional HQ in Saudi Arabia.

American mega-retailer Walmart succeeded in its lawsuit to break up with (formerly) exclusive card issuer Capital One, opening the retailer up to other card providers and ending their loss-sharing agreement.

JP Morgan must pay $100 million to settle a CFTC probe into the bank’s failure to properly monitor client orders.

The Intercontinental Exchange was fined $10 million for failing to quickly report a cyber intrusion to the SEC.

UK bank NatWest infuriated customers returning from holiday as its site went down.

A former MD at Citigroup is suing the bank for unlawful termination on the grounds of allegedly refusing to provide regulators with false information. 👀

💻 Fintech

🚀 Product Launches

Compliance platform Hummingbird* launched its new Customer Due Diligence solution, designed to speed up the manual review process and streamline ongoing risk management through AI.

StreetbeatPRO is your Embedded Agent for Finance that seamlessly connects and transforms complex data into actionable insights in real-time. Designed to empower brokers, banks, and financial apps, StreetbeatPRO offers advanced analytics across 250+ datasets, enabling decisive financial actions.

By integrating real-time stock data, alternative datasets, and customer information, StreetbeatPRO automates processes, significantly boosting efficiency and enhancing insights for informed decision-making. Experience the future of finance with StreetbeatPRO.

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📰 Other News

Payments giant PayPal hired Uber’s former head of advertising to run a new ad division that will leverage the company's payment information to serve ads to its millions of customers.

The Interledger Foundation, which is working towards a global open, interoperable payment network, will fund fintechs that use its protocol to bring payments to emerging markets and underserved populations.

Account security and payment credential tokenization provider VGS passed 3 billion payment credentials in its token vault – which it claims stores more than 70 percent of credentials in the United States.

Accounts receivable provider Versapay announced that 5 million businesses now transact on its payments network (5x growth in 18 months).

Brazilian neobank Nubank is rolling out a travel eSIM service that will give customers access to 10GB of free roaming internet in more than 40 countries without having to switch out their own existing physical SIM card or eSIM.

German financial regulator BaFin lifted the 60,000 customer cap that it had placed on German neobank N26.

Global neobank Revolut will connect to 14 new payment corridors via mobile wallets to African telcos Airtel, Orange Money and MTN.

New UK lender SilverRock was granted a banking license.

UAE neobank Wio realized a profit of $500,000 in 2023, its first full year of operations

Zopa made its buy-now-pay-later payments available to renewable energy provider Octopus' customers.

Interview: Neepa Patel, Cofounder & CEO of Themis

Listen to this episode from Fintech Business Weekly on Spotify. In this episode, I had the chance to sit down with Neepa Patel, cofounder and CEO of Themis, a compliance collaboration tool for banks and fintechs, on stage at last month’s Empire Fintech Conference in New York. Neepa and I had the chance to talk about:* What “fintech people” misunderstand about regulators* What fintechs should think about when selecting a bank partner* Whether or not tech is (and should be) a competitive differentiator in banking-as-a-service platforms“Many banks are still utilizing manual controls, processes and even spreadsheets to manage compliance and governance. We’ve been impressed with Themis’ collaborative and centralized modules to increase efficiency, and reduce complexities and internal costs while helping to streamline compliance controls.”— Candice Antinori, VP Compliance Management & CRA Officer at FinWise BankThemis is a user friendly, collaborative compliance platform to help financial institutions manage complex relationships across internal control groups and to help fintechs’ level up their own governance, risk, and compliance cultures.The platform provides a centralized compliance collaboration suite of purpose-built workflows and tools that seamlessly integrate risk, communications, documents and so much for internal teams and external partnerships between banks and fintechs. With Synapse entering into bankruptcy proceedings in the last few weeks, with knock-on impacts to Evolve Bank and Trust, Lineage, and multiple fintech programs, one could easily be forgiven for thinking fintech categorically is facing a regulatory reckoning. But, current turmoil notwithstanding, the bank-fintech partnership model will endure, with the players that prioritize compliance best suited to navigate the fallout.Learn more about how Themis banks are Elevating Governance, Risk and Compliance Cultures here.If you enjoy listening to this podcast and find value in it, please consider supporting me (and finhealth non-profits!) by signing up for a paid subscription. It wouldn’t be possible to do what I do without the support of listeners like you! Get full access to Fintech Business Weekly at fintechbusinessweekly.substack.com/subscribe

Spotify

🤝 Partnership Corner

Business banking startup Rho will partner with corporate spend platform Navan to let businesses add and manage corporate cards directly within Navan's travel and expense platform.

TransFi and Chainge partnered to enable improved DeFi accessibility and liquidity.

Western Union partnered with Plaid to enable bank payments in Europe.

👎 The Bad News

Embattled banking-as-a-service platform Synapse collapsed over the weekend, and may be forced to liquidate under Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Former FDIC chair Jelena McWilliams was appointed to lead Synapse's bankruptcy proceedings. You can read our coverage here:

Signals: Synapse wasn’t your typical BaaS

A unique set of challenges drove Synapse to bankruptcy– freezing access to funds for tens of thousands of end users.

This Week in FintechSophie Vo

In addition to raising its user cap, German regulator BaFin fined N26 €9.2 million for anti-money laundering failures.

Indian payments giant Paytm warned that it will have to cut jobs after the Indian central bank's regulatory clampdown.

UK wealth management provider Intelligent Money entered bankrupcty and will sell off its business assets to fellow provider Quai.

Come meet us in-person at thisweekinfintech.com/events