Is fintech the future of the banking industry, or its nemesis? Son Nguyen, Program Director at Vente-privee tells us about his point of view.
These players have initiated new markets or revamping old ageing business. Their targets usually focus on business where banks have a high margin and where traditional institutions can’t keep with the need and innovation coming from the digital space.
In a defensive posture, many banks are trying to protect their assets and somehow become reluctant to interact with these new actors. However fintech did and will bring agility and innovation where there were limited successes in these traditional sectors.
Paragon would be that a new breed of financial services breed and provide consumers real innovation and create a breach between traditional bank and financial services and those new digital services.
From a higher overview, the outcome might be different.
If we look back, 15 years ago another sector did face the same issue, i.e. the Retail. 15 years after 8 out of 10 largest e-commerce players are owned by Retail. Even during years, some believed that e-commerce would kill the retail now History has proven it will not be probably the case.
Digital, Entrepreneurship and Investments allow the sector to grow faster and mutate to the next generation of Consumers services. Afterwards, since the traditional actors would be able to acquire the fintech, it will only benefit them and in competitive way vs if they’ve tried to innovate themselves.
Of course, amidst the pack a few players will become the “Amazon” of the fintechs but the rest of the industry will be probably still be (or be owned) by the same names we already know.
So fintech might more be an evolution of the financial industry rather than a Spin-Off. This is of course a very personal take, but let’s rendezvous in 15 years to see how the story will unfold.About the author
Son Nguyen is the Program Director at Vente-privee, overseeing strategic plans for Finance and in particular Payment and Fraud. He’s part of the MRC European Advisory Board and FEVAD for payment commission and alongside with other regulatory commissions with French authorities.
