FinTech (Financial Technology)

[Ryan Shrott]

I attended a mathematical finance conference last weekend. To my surprise, most of the presentations were about the up-and-coming financial technology industry.

Some buzzwords from the conference: robo-advisor, BIG data, block chains, cyber security, hash functions, dark pools, hackers, machine learning, bitcoins, trading, infrastructure, engineering, data governance.

The presentations led me to believe that the FinTech industry is booming. There was some discussion about where all the big banks would be in the next 5 years. Will technology companies eventually replace the big banks?

I took some detailed notes at the conference. Please see the attached!

I am currently seeking full time employment for September. Am I wise to consider financial technology start-ups for employment? Is FinTech a fad?

Let's get some heated discussions going. I'm very interested hear everyone's opinions.

PS: Would love to hear some thoughts from:
@pingu
@alain
@Daniel Duffy
@Keith Tan
@Polter

 

[avarava]

Thanks a lot for sharing your experience. I will be starting MFE this year and I am also exploring careers in FinTech. FinTech is a very loosely defined term. I know about banks that have formed teams looking to automate manual processes and calling those teams FinTech to make it seem cool. However, my idea of FinTech is disruptive technologies which will make traditional banking redundant. For example, there are start ups in California which are using sophisticated algorithms to assess prospective borrower’s default probability (Traditional credit scores have longed outlived their utility), there are others which use machine learning in the insurance industry etc. If e-commerce wasn't a fad then so is FinTech as disruption in conventional banking and financial services has been long overdue. My only concern is that to excel in this nascent area, one needs very good programming skills so you may want to start learning coding if (like me) you come from a non CS background.

 

[Ryan Shrott]

I know about banks that have formed teams looking to automate manual processes and calling those teams FinTech to make it seem cool.

From my very short experience in industry (and from what I've heard from others), larger corporations tend to take very long to implement new technology.

However, my idea of FinTech is disruptive technologies which will make traditional banking redundant.

This is spot on in my opinion. If the big banks keep moving so slow compared to the FinTech industry, where will the big banks be in 10 years?

What's your opinion on BitCoin? I've talked to a lot of people about it and everyone has conflicting opinions.

 

[avarava]

What's your opinion on BitCoin? I've talked to a lot of people about it and everyone has conflicting opinions.

My opinion is of little value because I do not fully understand bitcoin apart from the fact that one needs a lot of computing power and even more geek quotient to mine it. That makes the currency both democratic and meritocratic.

I did make some money on this asset back in 2013 but quickly withdrew as the wild swings were way beyond my risk appetite. However, looking at the present valuation of the bitcoin only makes me very very sad. There may be difference of opinion on Bitcoin but there is definitely a consensus around the massive risk of government intervention that this asset carries.

 

[Varun Dubey]

Bitcoin creator is unknown. There are only certain assumptions about what kind of a person he is. Why would you trust it? Plus a lot of illegal activity going unregulated over it.

FinTech is good in theory but banks only move over to new tech (or even new programming languages) if it's stable in their perception. Pretty hard to convince those guys

 

[Daniel Duffy]

Prediction is difficult, especially predicting the future

===
But technology changes every [5,8] years. It was not so long ago that MFC was OOP state-o-the-art!

 

[Ryan Shrott]

It was not so long ago that MFC was OOP state-o-the-art!

haha. Now the nick name is Microsoft frustration classes!

 

[Tom Maloney]

Wall Street Is Trying to Beat Silicon Valley at Its Own Game

 

[pingu]

haha. Now the nick name is Microsoft frustration classes!

MFC was always a frustration and it was never state of the art but it was the only game in town so you sucked it up and dealt with it.

 

[pingu]

What's your opinion on BitCoin? I've talked to a lot of people about it and everyone has conflicting opinions.

The resolution of the Bitcoin experiment

 

[Ryan Shrott]

@pingu - Thanks for the article. The author nicely summarizes the whole picture.

 

[pingu]

@pingu - Thanks for the article. The author nicely summarizes the whole picture.

your welcome!