The Bottom Line

The “hawks versus doves” debate regarding financial institutions and FinTechs has been raging for years. Are these startup firms (and even some established industry service providers) that seek to reinvent financial services actually out to steal banks’ and credit unions’ lunches? Or is there more that unites these groups than divides them, creating opportunities for synergy and collaboration?

Recently, SRM identified the use of artificial intelligence (AI) as a trend that would have a significant impact on the financial services industry in 2019.  Narrowly defined AI is the ability for machines to use complex algorithms to interact and learn to do tasks previously performed by humans. 

Our colleagues at SRM Europe in London recently shared with us how fewer people are using cash to pay for goods and services.  In the United Kingdom the thought of a cashless society is not necessarily a welcomed development for some. 

As noted in the previous blog, cards in the UK are continuing to be adopted by more and more consumers because they are more convenient and, in many cases, safer than carrying cash.  Due to these benefits the use of payment cards to purchase goods and services will continue to climb, However, some feel that this progression toward a cashless society is everything but harmless.  Here are their reasons why.

Most know that fewer and fewer people are using cash to pay for goods and services.  The actual rate of decline and habits around the use of cash or payment cards varies from country to country.  Our colleagues across the pond at SRM Europe in London recently shared with us how this trend is manifesting in the United Kingdom and why the thought of a cashless society is not necessarily a welcomed development for some. 

Our CEO, Brad Downs recently shared SRM’s key fintech trends for 2019, with a focus on items that banks and credit unions should factor into their near-term planning. Allow me to build upon those by looking more specifically at payments trends while also applying a broader time horizon, isolating the macro-level developments that have been underway for some time and continue to shape the industry.

It’s fascinating how quickly economic tides can turn. For the past decade, banks and credit unions have been focused on lending—first in shoring up the quality of their portfolios, then in attracting new customers to prudently expand loan activity. With rates now on the rise and net interest margins widening, however, attention has shifted to attracting and retaining deposits.

The payments world woke to a jolt last Wednesday with the news that Fiserv had announced an agreement to acquire First Data in a $22 billion stock transaction, creating a fintech mega-firm. Most of the early coverage focused on the deal’s financial aspects, and on private equity firm KKR coming closer to finally turning the page on its massive 2007 buyout of First Data. However, we’d like to focus on the implications for customers of this new entity - particularly the financial institutions that comprise the bulk of its business.

Unless they work in the industry, most consumers who make a purchase with a card would struggle to define the word “interchange.” On the other hand, for the organizations who largely make it possible to use cards to make a purchase – issuers, merchants and processors – interchange is always top of mind.

At the start of each year, SRM publishes a list of the trends that are most likely to impact the financial services industry over the coming 12 months.  The trends we described are based on qualitative and quantitative research as well as from one-on-one conversations we had with bankers and thought leaders in the industry.

As more financial institutions get serious about modernizing their core systems and revisiting opportunities surrounding contactless cards, our firm has noticed an uptick in the volume of requests for proposals (RFPs) issued as part of the vendor management process. SRM sees this as a positive development. In fact, we generally recommend that financial institutions regularly subject all their supplier relationships to an RFP process.