Financial technology, also known as FinTech, embodies all the technologies used to streamline and digitize traditional financial services, including banking and payment methods. Fintech refers to financial-related applications, algorithms, programs, or software deployed on mobile devices or desktop computers.
Certain hardware, like internet-enabled piggy banks and ATMs, are considered FinTech. People use Fintech when they open an app on their smartphones to pay for online purchases and check bank account balances.
Some eCommerce companies and businesses depend on Fintech to deal with transactions, process payments, and finish various accounting tasks. Some Fintech channels can control typical banking activities like making deposits, transferring money between accounts, paying bills, and applying for loans.
Many venues have powerful hardware and software configurations to maintain crypto exchanges and peer-to-peer lending. Financial services utilize Fintech to implement different backend operations, such as account monitoring and underwriting loan applications.
The Evolution of FinTech
Though Fintech might sound like a new development, it’s not a new concept. According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the first known utilization of Fintech was in 1971. After two years, the US saw its first ATM open for business in Rockville Center, New York. Then, ATM was regarded as a state-of-the-art Fintech platform, although the term had already been developed.
In the early 1990s, the development of a centralized signature verification for checks, one of the examples of early Fintech, started.
The technologies have kept on improving over the decades. Starting with ATM, the following significant manifestation of Fintech was the emergence of NASDAQ in 1971, followed by the introduction of full-scale online banking in the 1980s. By the end of the new millennium, eight banks in the US had over a million online clients combined. It may sound like a small number, but Fintech adoption in 2001 was a consideration.
Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan, says, “Hundreds of businesses are very good at alleviating lending pain points because they can underwrite loans in minutes rather than weeks.” The CEO noticed that those startups were becoming competitors to organizations’ services.
It would take Morgan more than five years to make a worth of 25 million USD investment in Fintech startups. Goldman Sachs was leading when they introduced online banking called Marcus three years after.
The moves from Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan show how disruptive Fintech is to traditional banking services. Existing financial institutions offer millions in venture funding for startups or develop their Fintech ventures to remain competitive.
Online banking, a mixture of tech-enabled and traditional financial services, has become commonplace. It’s an event seen in developed nations and anywhere in the world.
Current State of FinTech
There were many 26,000 Fintech startups worldwide in 2021. Almost half of them are based in the US. The country has the largest concentration of new Fintech firms and also leads in the number of startups turned unicorns.
The US produced 81 Fintech unicorns in New York and California in late 2021. In comparison, in the second place, China counted eleven of them, followed by the United Kingdom with 10 unicorns.
The American province has been at the forefront of the evolution worldwide, with many 10 755 Fintech startups. The Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region sat below with 9,233 Fintech startups. Asia Pacific region took third with 6,268 Fintech startups.
Although the United Kingdom did not top in quantity, the nation remains the next hub, second only to the United States. London is the unchallenged Fintech leader of all European towns, mainly because of its superiority in Blockchain services and personal finance.
The United Kingdom has seen a few dozen unicorns and has mo4 than twenty reputable powerful accelerators, including BBVA, Anthemis, and Barclays.
In addition, detailed Fintech regulations and current tax reductions make the nation more interesting for startups than before.
Industries That Mostly Use Fintech
Open Banking
A financial system management term is where people should be given access to bank data. The main purpose of openness is to motivate app developers to build an incorporated network of financial institutions and customers. The apps may be third-party providers.
Cryptocurrency
A decentralized banking system via a distributed ledger technology. The mechanism depends on Blockchain to manage financial records of transactions or payments.
Blockchain develops codes to deal with and confirm transactions between sellers and buyers. Some significant instances of crypto are NFTA, virtual cash, and Bitcoin, and no genuine money is included in the systems.
Robo-advisor
A blend of Fintech and artificial intelligence that offers automated investment or financial advice based on computer and algorithms analysis. The idea behind robo advisor is to reduce risk and improve user ROI.
RegTech
Financial services utilize software to ensure that their business activities comply with the rules and regulations. RegTech is effective in helping enforce anti-money laundering regulations and customer rights regulations.
Users of Fintech Products
FinTech has four major groups of users and these include; business to business for banks, customers of those banks, startups, and consumers. By extension, the augmentation of smartphone technology and mobile banking is expected to facilitate intensified and cut-down connections between the four groups.
FinTech Against Recession
The conventional banking or financial system is usually considered difficult and slow. Fintech concentrates on merging the design with an innovative digital interface. Hence, the undertaking worked well.
In 2022, Fintech startups processed a financial transaction worth 32.5 billion USD, a whopping 27 percent increase from 2021. Investment in Fintech saw an increase of 9 percent during the same period in Europe.
There is not an immediate risk to the growth of Fintech globally despite the recent recession. The COVID and recession-related investment threats have skyrocketed the utilization of Fintech and the demand for complete digitized financial services.
Fintech remains a priority for investor in the predictable future because of its future-proof system and insusceptible to real-world lockdown, while the recession facilitates a general economic slowdown. Investors take fewer risks during the recession.
Yet, despite the long-game methods, Fintech’s great potential to be the main part of the financial industry promises a certain ROI.
Conclusion
With an estimated market value of 5 trillion USD and professionals anticipating growth of more than twenty-three percent for the next 5 years, it is becoming clear that the pandemic proved beneficial to the success of Fintech and even increased its development.
This success and progress amid the COVID crisis make it obvious that Fintech’s impact will last forever.
It will help if all businesses maintain Fintech trends and explore financial techniques tailored to your company’s missions. One of the effective steps to aid businesses in staying afloat in this rapidly evening industry is keeping an open mind.
