Introduction As mentioned by Zanny Minton-Beddoes, Editor-in-Chief, The Economist, today on Fareed Zakaria, (CNN) most people understand the logic and need for the Lockdown. But she went on to say, there is no clear way out of it, and a return to normal. The defining model that shook the UK and US governments was produced by Imperial College by the team led by Dr Neil Ferguson. That document indicated with no mitigating effort, the US would see 2,200,000 deaths, and UK would see 550,000 deaths. I will not attempt to compete with the analysis of the models performed by academics … Continue reading Banks’ considerations for the end of covid-19 lockdown

  This from the FT highlights the direction of P2P lending is closing in on the direction set in Canada in 2008. His frustration stems from the consultation paper published just over a week ago by the Financial Conduct Authority, which proposed placing the same restrictions on peer-to-peer lenders that already apply to high-risk platforms, such as equity crowdfunding sites.  This would mean that to invest in peer-to-peer loans, investors would in future have to be certified as sophisticated, be very wealthy, be advised by an authorised person, or certify they will not invest more than 10 per cent of their … Continue reading P2P Lending catches up with Canada

I have done a fair bit of research on Blockchain technologies as an alternative to SWIFT and that is really what we are talking about when it comes to international payments. This story caught my attention. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blockchain-ripple/banks-unlikely-to-process-payments-with-distributed-ledgers-for-now-says-ripple-idUSKBN1J92JG NEW YORK (Reuters) – Banks are unlikely to use distributed ledgers to process cross-border payments for now because of scalability and privacy issues, according to Ripple, one of the most prominent startups developing the technology If we look at SWIFT it is no more than a messaging system that is accepted by banks to trust each other a payment has been made and … Continue reading Finally someone in the community acknowledges Blockchain challenge for Banks

Back in 2007, then in 2016 I looked at the FaceBook business model and compared it to AOL. Here is the thing. AOL which was the US #1 internet source at one point, lost out because its mission was to retain users within the walled garden. It is not the first time this argument has been used but consider …. AOL strategy was all about building tools within their own garden, and as early as the 1990’s they even had their own browser and their own markup language (think proprietary version of HTML). They had their own CD which let … Continue reading FaceBook challenges run deep and are fundamental

The Independent notes the significant change that has crept up on us. Expect more in Canada methinks. This weekend a major change in the way banks manage your data takes place, one that could completely revolutionise how we bank, who owns our financial data and which companies can offer us targeted financial services. It’s called Open Banking and it’s driven by a new EU directive and new UK competition rules. Changes taking effect this weekend mean that banks will have to share financial data such as transaction history and spending patterns with other (regulated) third-party providers if the account holder … Continue reading Open Banking has arrived … what?

Good article in Medium about the long time coming shift from FaceBook. Here is how Zuck defended the move: “The research shows that when we use social media to connect with people we care about, it can be good for our well-being. We can feel more connected and less lonely, and that correlates with long term measures of happiness and health. On the other hand, passively reading articles or watching videos even if they’re entertaining or informative may not be as good. Based on this, we’re making a major change to how we build Facebook. I’m changing the goal I give our … Continue reading FaceBook finally gets smart and plans exit from news

I have had the hardest time locating a blog tool for Mac. it has been a struggle for 5 years.  This is my latest try.  it has potential.  Cannot paste pics but able to use insert. Continue reading Test Post 3 – final