A brief look back at week 31
The week started with Lufax Vice President Yunny Lee considering a “self-improving future of finance.” She was sharing her insights on the future of finance at The Asian Banker's Finance China 2019.
Lee said that that there were three key pain points of the financial industry: high cost, high threshold for entry and low efficiency. She explained that the advent of internet-based platforms and the rise of AI had helped to remove physical limitations and expand service coverage, lower the entry point, and make financial services more inclusive.
Mid-week we heard that although US fintech investment was still strong - at $18.3bn invested across 470 deals - the rate had slowed in the first half of the year. The figures were put together by KPMG in its H1’ 2019 Pulse of Fintech report. The report also said that the second half of the year could see record-breaking highs which, it said, should be powered by large M&A closings.
ePayRails, a US fintech payment as a service provider (PaaS), secured a Series A funding of $2.45m. The round was led by Aspire Fund Management, putting up $2m, and they were joined by a consortium of additional private investors.
We finish in Europe, specifically Germany, where Wirecard and Sisal Group have signed an agreement to collaborate in the field of contactless payment solutions for the brand SisalPay and drive digital payments in Italy. With more than 15m customers and 200m transactions per year, SisalPay is Sisal Group's payment services brand.