Brett King interviewed Antony Jenkins for a LendIt USA 2017 keynote presentation titled, "The End of the Beginning: Accelerating Transformation in Financial Services"; King also talked with a number of conference participants in a Breaking Banks podcast titled, "Innovations in Lending at LendIt 2017"; the podcast provides insight from Brock Blake of Lendio, Christoph Rieche of iwoca, Ohad Samet from TrueAccord, Peter Renton from LendIt, John Owens and Emmanuel Daniel of The Asian Banker. Source
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LendIt USA 2017, the world’s biggest show in lending and fintech, will kick off for the 5th year on March...
LendIt provides details on LendIt USA 2017 training sessions in their blog post; the training sessions will be focused on sales and marketing, and technology and operations; the two sessions will be held on March 6 and will include interactive discussion; the sales and marketing training session will be in the morning and will include discussion on digital marketing channels, and lead generation, retention and engagement; the technology and operations session will be in the afternoon and will include discussion on artificial intelligence and the importance of mobile. Source
India has fast become one of the world's most interesting fintech markets; at LendIt USA 2017 we hosted a fireside chat focused on digital credit for the India population and how their biometric Aadhaar system plays a key role; a few key developments have helped the India population, the ease of acquiring a smartphone and the Aadhaar system; Aadhaar started with an investment by the India government eight years ago and today there is one billion Indians who have an Aadhaar number with key identifiable pieces of information; the government then began linking Aadhaar with the banking system and enlisted fintech firms to begin extending microloans to individuals and SMEs; Aadhaar helps to solve the biggest issue with lending, KYC, by using a retina scan or biometric signature to verify the borrower; the fireside chat also talked through how the lending process worked with Aadhaar and how it has helped to extend credit to a segment of the population that only a few years ago was unable to access capital. Source
As with past conferences LendIt aims to bring new speakers to the conference; this year LendIt has confirmed Ash Gupta (President of American Express), Harit Talwar (CEO of Marcus) and Thomas Curry (Head of the OCC) among many others who are new to LendIt; the agenda will also include the leaders in online lending with representation from companies such as Lending Club, Prosper, OnDeck and loanDepot; the conference will be the largest for the industry to date with a 100,000 square foot exhibit hall, featuring over 200 companies; LendIt will end the conference with the first ever industry awards dinner. Source
Dave Girouard is the founder and CEO of Upstart; Girouard spent almost his entire career working for tech firms including Apple and Google and a lot of Upstart's team actually comes from Google; given that they lean heavier towards the 'tech' side of fintech, Girouard has a unique perspective; shares the general trend of software disrupting every business and that every business will become a tech business; discusses the history of marketplace lending, attributes of a marketplace and the evolution of the marketplaces; reports on how artificial intelligence and machine learning can help in a number of ways including creation of real time analysis, development of customized credit scoring, expanded access to credit through broader underwriting variables and faster processing; also discusses some of the challenges that currently keep machine learning solutions from the mainstream including adverse selection, loan stacking, fraud and regulatory concerns; ends with the benefits of alternative machine learning technology including more inclusion, lower rates, lower costs and greater financial support for consumers. Source
Regulation in the US is far different than in China; CredEx is a Chinese company that shares the state of regulation there; Jo Ann Barefoot shares her perspective on regulation in the US, having spent most of her career working in consumer protection and financial inclusion; she believes that we have produced a regulatory system that has high cost and low value which has left consumers confused by products; while not discounting the importance of regulation, Barefoot shares that fintechs can do more to further goals around financial inclusion than regulation can; one area where the US is lagging behind much of the world, specifically China is in mobile adoption and regulators in the US are struggling to keep up as technology quickly changes. Source
While fintech innovation has greatly evolved in recent years, there is still much more to be accomplished; one area available for significant market growth is financial inclusion; Lend Academy talks about fintech innovation for the underserved bank customer in their article; LendIt will be running a financial inclusion track this year at LendIt USA to help support development of this market opportunity. Source
There is a worldwide problem in that not enough people have access to financial opportunity in underserved markets; at LendIt USA 2017 we hosted a panel that focused on impact investing and opportunities for the underserved in financial services; panelists discussed the size of the market, how technology has helped to close the gap and why they feel that investing with their hearts and wallets is the better way to go; the discussion talked through the difference between regular investing and impact investing, as well as what investors look for when an opportunity presents itself; technology has allowed for low to middle income families to have a better understanding of their daily financial health and to expect better services; the panel also touched on the risks involved in certain markets, how to assess potential investments in emerging markets and how the local regulatory bodies can play a role; looking at investments beyond the financial return has helped communities around the world and this looks to be a trend that is on the rise. Source
Celent is a research and advisory firm to mid and large sized banks, credit unions and technology providers; the company partnered with FI Navigator to present data on mobile app adoption in banking; we know what the historical channels of branches, contact centers, ATMs, internet and mobile are all about; mobile is becoming an omnichannel platform for both bankers and customers spanning branches, contact centers and ATMs which Bob Meara explores in his presentation; shares that half of retail customers aren't using digital channels, concerns from consumers about digital and mobile channels, and other data about mobile adoption. Source