Houlihan Lokey Further Builds Its Corporate Finance Capabilities in Australia

The global pandemic response for merchants has been short-lived and has also revealed that most of them will be needing a more powerful and solid option for digital payments.

This situation is acting as a trigger for fresh investments, partnerships, and acquisitions even though this was expected to be a low time for such activities.Recently Stripe had announced an investment round of $600 million to expand its product range which would allow enterprises to have easy and simple access to online payment transactions.And now, not long after that activity, a California based fintech Rapyd has acquired an Iceland-based merchant acquirer, Korta.

This acquisition has been put to motion with the intention of using the omnichannel card acquiring system of Korta to feed the hosted fintech services of Rapyd.Raypd has high hopes of attracting merchants who might want to build a local digital payment and shopping mix quickly by using the blend of automated self-service and API offered by Rapyd.Arik Shtilman, the CEO of Raoyd stated that in times like these, service providers cannot rely on providing physical services.

They have to be capable of providing 50% of their business services online.

This he believes is a feature of the new disaster recovery plan.The core business of Rapyd is supply chain automation where it enables merchants from one country to buy products from merchants in another country and make the payment to the seller merchants in their local currency using a digital wallet.

The seller merchant can then use that payment and pay their suppliers in their local currencies.The valuation of Rapyd is around $1.2 billion and it has processors of local payments to be capable of supporting e-commerce and B2B along with businesses sharing economy in the U.S. and overseas markets like Singapore and Brazil.The transaction details of the deal haven’t been disclosed but apparently, involve tens of millions of dollars.

Digital has been a buzzword in the ever-evolving banking industry across the globe.

This evolution focuses on designing a seamless, versatile and collaborative experience for the end consumers.

Technological advancement anchored this transformation by upgrading retail and mobile banking to neobank startups, propelling banking into a digitalized future.The rapid advancement in technology has created many challenges for the traditional brick and mortar branches.

Though they are well equipped with financial resources and consumer relationships with a decent reach, they need to adopt digital ways for banking to stay relevant in the future.Here are some ways how digital can shape the banking landscape:Frictionless banking through utilization of B-a-a-S or API Banking: Legacy institutions are best positioned to succeed if they commit to full-fledged digital transformation by introducing extremely adaptable solutions and can utilize Open APIs to integrate new financial systems and open banking software, allowing faster expansion.

The most common of these solutions is Banking-as-a-Service (B-a-a-S), where digital banks and other third parties can connect with the bank’s system directly via APIs.Emergence of Personalized banking tools — The emerging digital banking solutions focus on providing self-learning digital banking software tools sensitive and intuitive to customer needs by utilizing a range of cutting-edge technologies to increase consumer engagement, including AI-powered chatbots, wearable assistance, personal finance Management, P2P Payments through voice bots, and QR code scanning.Data Analytics for Customized Solutions: — Financial service providers will get a deep insight into customers’ lives owing to Big Data, IoT, Blockchain and Open Banking.

They can better the lives of their customer by employing the following techniques: -The technologies such as IoT tend to track the real lives of customers rather than relying on manual submissions, the customer data will be safe and secure through blockchain technology which would be further authenticated via AI.

What are the benefits of blockchain in the banking sector?

What is the role of blockchain & how does blockchain affect the banking & financial industry?Learn more: https://diro.io/how-does-blockchain-affect-banking-industry/

Advancing technology has started influencing the BFSI sector, and we witness innovative app solutions in financial services.

These solutions fall under the fintech category and contribute to improving services.

Mobile wallets, banking apps, and cryptocurrency-related apps are some of the most popular examples of fintech apps.

In this blog, we are going to understand the role and benefits of cross-platform app development for a fintech firm

Rise in adoption of new applications and services in the banking sector, supportive government regulations, and enhanced customer engagement with open banking APIs drive the growth of the global open banking market.

However, lack of awareness regarding open banking, data security, and management of security threats hinder the market growth.

On the other hand, collaboration activities between fintech firms and banks create new opportunities in the industry.The global open banking market generated $7.29 billion in 2018, and is expected to reach $43.15 billion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 24.4% from 2019 to 2026.

The report provides an extensive analysis of changing market dynamics, market size & projections, top investment pockets, major segments, and competitive scenarios.Based on financial service, the banking and capital markets segment contributed to more than half of the total share of the global open banking market in 2018, and is expected to maintain its lead share in terms of revenue during the forecast period.

However, the payments segment is projected to witness the largest CAGR of 27.3% from 2019 to 2026.

The research also discusses segments such as digital currencies and value-added services.