The latest report from Accenture forecasts financial institutions and services in Asia-Pacific to invest in cloud technology, mobile wallets and blockchain. Moreover, FinTech investments in this area set to at least quadruple in 2015.
According to the report: “Investments in financial technology (fintech) across Asia-Pacific skyrocketed in 2015 – from about $880 million in all of 2014 to nearly $3.5 billion in just the first nine months of 2015.”
The major role to this trend has the increasing value of investments in and from China. Along with investments from Alibaba Group Holding into a mobile payments and e-commerce business Paytm, comes fundraising efforts by Ping An Insurance Group for P2P lender and financial-asset exchange Lufax.
Jon Allaway, senior managing director of Accenture’s Financial Services group in ASEAN and executive sponsor of the FinTech Innovation Lab Asia-Pacific commented:
“Financial services institutions are embracing cloud technology, mobile wallets and blockchain to fundamentally redefine their business and operational models. We are seeing this in the increased investments from banks in fintech venture capital funding, incubators and startups.”
One of the reasons for the recent rise of Bitcoin price is a significant growth of investments from Asia, and China. According to March report from Goldman Sachs more than 80% of bitcoin transactions have taken place in Chinese yuan.
Moreover, Greg Carroll, senior managing director and head of financial services for Accenture in Australia and New Zealand, said: "Banks across Australia are looking at ways to incorporate the underlying technology, blockchain, into their systems. This opens the door for innovation and that's where fintech startups may find an opportunity in Australia".
The previous study from Accenture shows that only 6% of board directors and just 3% of CEOs of the world’s biggest banks have any technology experience. In the new report Accenture advices financial institutions and banks to focus on developments in Blockchain, Cloud and Cybersecurity:
“As a stand-alone technology, blockchain could help banks, credit card companies and clearinghouses collaborate to create safer, faster accounting and optimize capital use by reducing counterparty risk and transaction latency.”