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That’s according to ING’s chief executive, Steven Van Rijswijk. He told an audience at Sibos that regulators need to offer banks an equivalent to the second Payments Services Directive (PSD2).

Van Rijswijk is “strongly advocat[ing]” that regulators come up with an equivalent for banks
“We strongly advocate that there needs to be a level playing field,” says Van Rijswijk.
“You see with the new regulation, new platforms and open banking, that a number of competitors are entering this space.

“They get access to our customers’ data, and at the same point in time, they can use their own data as well which they get from customers.”

From Sibos 2020: ING’s CEO urges regulators to give banks a PSD2 equivalent – FinTech Futures:

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“In a world of CBDCs, I am not sure what Swift would do,” Birch says.

“It involves an awful lot of messing around to do with settlement, reconciliation, clearing and so on.”

He imagines a world in which an African farmer buys fertiliser from China and receives payment for the soya beans he grows all in CBDC.

“There may not even be banks involved in that transaction, let alone Swift,” he claims.

From Sibos 2020: ‘In a world of CBDCs, I am not sure what Swift would do’ – David Birch:

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I had the opportunity to listen to a fascinating virtual armchair discussion on “Digital Currencies and the International Monetary System” between Brent J. McIntosh, Under Secretary for International Affairs at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and Kenji Okamura, Vice Minister of Finance for International Affairs at the Japanese Ministry of Finance. The discussion, moderated by Stephanie Segal (a Senior Fellow in Economics Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

 

Kenji Okamura, Japanese Vice Minister of Finance for Intl. Affairs on the dangers of “idosyncratic” central bank digital currencies that “do not possess the features necessary to maintain the stability of the international monetary and financial system”

 

Does “maintaining the stabilty of the international monetary and financial system” actually mean maintaining dollar hegemony, or do the panelists think this might be a period of punctuated equilibirum that leads to a stable but different system in the not-too-distant future?

 

During the following panel discussion with Tommaso Mancini-Griffoli
(Division Chief of Payments, Currencies and Infrastructure, Monetary and Capital Markets Department, IMF),  Neha Narula (Director of the Digital Currency Initiative, MIT Media Lab) and Naveed Sultan (Global Head of Treasury & Trade Solutions Group, Citigroup) there was a number of themes that caught my attention. One of them was the issue of competition between currencies on characteristics other than stability. I am very curious about possible development here and have written before about the use of currencies that are more closely linked to the communities that they serve.

 

While I was listening to this interesting discussion, I saw on the inter web that

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Square, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s payment company, has purchased $50 million worth of bitcoin.

Announcing the news on Thursday, Square said “cryptocurrency is an instrument of economic empowerment and provides a way to participate in a global monetary system, which aligns with the company’s purpose.”

Jack Dorsey’s Square purchases $50 million worth of bitcoin  – The Block:

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In some cases, Pennsylvania law enforcement has deemed seized cash to be “guilty” simply because it’s been in circulation. The article cites two studies detailing how much drug residue ends up on cash, which has the possibility of turning innocent people into suspects Pennsylvania cops have no interest in charging criminally. A 2008 study showed 42% of currency had trace amounts of meth on it. A 2009 study said nearly 90% of currency is contaminated with cocaine residue. If Pennsylvania cops can’t find another pretext to seize cash, they’ll test the cash itself for drug residue and go from there.

From Pennsylvania Cops Are Still Abusing Asset Forfeiture To Help Themselves To People’s Cash | Techdirt:

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Under a quick-rebound scenario, BCG’s outlook suggests that the global payments revenue pool will expand from $1.5 trillion in 2019 to $1.8 trillion in 2024, a compound annual growth rate of 4.4%. Although solid, this CAGR is much lower than the 7.3% annual growth the industry enjoyed from 2014 to 2019.

In a slow-recovery scenario, the global revenue pool would reach $1.7 trillion by 2024, a CAGR of 2.7%. Under a deeper-impact scenario, the revenue pool would grow by only a moderate CAGR of 1.1%.

The second half of the decade, however, looks considerably brighter, driven by economic expansion, advancements in payments infrastructure, e-commerce growth, and greater financial inclusion. From 2024 to 2029, global payments revenues should rise by 4.4% to 5.6% annually, states the consultancy, roughly 1.5 times faster than the growth of banking revenues overall. By 2029, the revenue pool could swell to between $1.9 trillion and $2.4 trillion, depending on the extent of the economic recovery.

From Payments revenue growth forecasts almost halved under brightest post-Pandemic outlook:

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PBOC’s deputy governor Fan Yifei told an audience at the virtual Sibos 2020 event that until “late August” the bank had processed 3.1276 million transactions. The total value of theses add up RMB 1.1 billion ($162 million).

More than 6,700 pilot use cases have been implemented for the CBDC
“An aggregate of 113,300 personal digital wallets and 8,859 corporate digital wallets have been opened,” the deputy governor says.

From Sibos 2020: Chinese central bank processes CBDC worth $162m in 2020 – FinTech Futures:

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If there’s one fintech segment that has been an unalloyed pandemic winner, it’s the business Afterpay is in: online point-of-sale installment financing. It’s benefiting from both consumers’ shift to online buying and their reluctance, in these uncertain economic times, to take on new credit card debt.

From The Pandemic Plutocrats: How Covid Is Creating New Fintech Billionaires:

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If there’s one fintech segment that has been an unalloyed pandemic winner, it’s the business Afterpay is in: online point-of-sale installment financing. It’s benefiting from both consumers’ shift to online buying and their reluctance, in these uncertain economic times, to take on new credit card debt.

From The Pandemic Plutocrats: How Covid Is Creating New Fintech Billionaires:

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The Amorites were a Semitic people who seem to have emerged from western Mesopotamia (modern-day Syria) at some point prior to the 3rd millennium BCE. In Sumerian they were known as the Martu or the Tidnum (in the Ur III Period), in Akkadian by the name of Amurru, and in Egypt as Amar, all of which mean ‘westerners’ or ‘those of the west’, as does the Hebrew name Amorite.

From Amorite – Ancient History Encyclopedia:

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Shu-Sin (2037-2029 B.C.) attempted to forestall the encroachments of the tribal Amorites by the construction of his Wall of Mardu, or Amorite Wall. In 2034 BC he built ‘the Amorite wall’ in order to keep the city safe from barbarian attacks. But the wall did not hold them for long. The Amorites established themselves as rulers of most most of the numerous city-states and petty kingdoms into which Mesopotamia again quickly disintegrated.

From Wall of Mardu / Amorite Wall / Western Wall:

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This situation came to crisis during the latter part of the Ur III Period (also known as the Sumerian Renaissance, 2047-1750 BCE), when King Shulgi of the Sumerian city of Ur constructed a wall 155 miles (250 kilometers) long specifically to keep the Amorites out of Sumer. The wall was too long to be properly manned, however, and also presented the problem of not being anchored at either end to any kind of obstacle; an invading force could simply walk around the wall to bypass it, and that seems to be precisely what the Amorites did.

From Amorite – Ancient History Encyclopedia:

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This all took place around 2034 BCE: that is, around four thousand years ago. It seems that the idea of building symbolic walls that do nothing to prevent migration is not only not new but a fundamental human trait, as old as civilisations themselves.

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One thing that is fascinating about OnlyFans is that because it involves the exchange of real dollars, which opens up plentiful opportunities for scams and fraud, it is ironically the social platform most driven by the mantra “know your customer.” In order to sign up as a creator, you must prove your identity with a full bank, address and license validation process.

From Lessons From the Rise of OnlyFans — The Information:

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