Etienne Kiss-Borlase | FinTech Trends to Watch for in 2019

FinTech Trends

to Watch for in 2019 Etienne Kiss-Borlase

Innovation and New Technology

Trends are always changing in the area of financial technology (fintech), and 2019 will be no exception. As innovation and new technology combine, it helps create larger, financially stronger organizations, fuels acquisitions and creates new ways to improve different activities in the world of finance.

Possible IPOs Many fintech startups have been wary of having their company go public. This isn’t surprising as a significant number of these type of companies have watched their share prices crumble. Regardless, there may be a few IPOs to out watch for in 2019. Two likely candidates include Credit Karma and Stripe.

Besides those two, most companies will likely focus on taking a slow approach by creating better products and scaling up.

Acquisitions A large number of fintech companies been working on their balance sheets and cash flow.

This has created an environment that may fuel acquisitions by larger banks that have excess capital. It looks like the trend in 2019 for acquisitions will be increased as there is a large amount of interest by the big finance companies.

Big Finance and Big Technology Concerns over privacy grew for a few big technology companies in the past year. These concerns will make it difficult for big technology firms to move into the finance space. While Google has been experimenting with Google Pay in Asia, it will take a good amount of time for major technology companies to truly understand how to succeed in big finance.

Faster Payments Customer experience is an integral part of the goals that big banks focus on. In 2019, more consumers will be able to use contactless cards when they are making a transaction at the checkout line. This speeds up the process and makes consumers happy.

The introduction of this technology isn’t surprising as large banks are working to reclaim their hold on how people pay for products. Google, Apple and Amazon have implemented ways to make it easy to pay for products. The big banks need to compete with that.

Funding Continues Funding was important for many fintech companies in 2018. Capital investment by large investors such as SoftBank helped to create growth. Other large investors need to spend some of their capital in large chunks in 2019. Unless there is a significant shift in the economy that signifies a slowdown, funding should continue.