The IMF warms up to the US. Cooperation and Connectedness—an Address to the Associated Press | IMF By Christine Lagarde Managing Director, International Monetary Fund Washington, April 3, 2012 As prepared for delivery Good morning. I am delighted to be here. I would like to acknowledge Tom Curley, who is just stepping down as Associated Press president and CEO after a lifetime of distinguished service in journalism. A warm thanks to Kathleen Carroll too. It is important for the IMF to maintain a good, open, dialogue with all members, especially the United States—our largest shareholder. You, the media, play an … Continue reading Cooperation and Connectedness–the IMF warms up to the US

Its been a while since I wrote about Groupon.  Back then my main issue was their misuse of accounting rules to ignore marketing costs when calculating profits and basically falsify profitability.  They were called out on that by the SEC.  However that might be chicken feed compared to what they are up to now. Groupon is essentially a sub-prime lender that does zero risk assessment | reDesign Well, for starters, it’s not a coupon company nor a marketing company. At its core, Groupon’s U.S. business is a receivables factoring business, as I wrote last year. They give loans to small … Continue reading This company is the opposite of “do no evil"– Groupon

Peer-to-Peer lending in the UK has suddenly become fashionable.  First Andy Haldane mentioned P2P as a valid and needed catalyst for innovation in financial services on Mar 14th.  Now we have demand for P2P returns from City investors, and finally the government are getting into the P2P business. City moves in on peer-to-peer lending | ft.com As this type of “direct lending” has expanded into business loans – through websites such as Funding Circle and ThinCats – it has started to attract the attention of more sophisticated clients who are keen to lend larger sums. Funding Circle lifted the maximum … Continue reading City moves in on peer-to-peer lending | ft.com

Here are recommendations from the Government of Canada digital Payments report released yesterday. Now the comments in the Federal Budget make sense.  The Canadian Payments Association (CPA) was designed in the days of cheques. Time to bring the bureaucracy up to date. Government must lead the change. For Canada’s payments system to substantially modernize, changes are required in multiple arenas, from consumer behaviours to accounting solutions, to the very procedures governments rely upon in delivering services. Industry has not implemented change due in part to uncertainty and lack of coordination. Therefore, the Government of Canada should lead the change by … Continue reading Canada digital payments report–intends to upgrade the Canadian Payments Association to meet needs of mobile payments

Following the budget yesterday and the reference to banking governance, it can be no co-incidence this report is released today.  (ht finextra) The opening remarks note: The Task Force for the Payments System Review has found that unless Canada develops a modern digital payments system, Canadians will be unable to fully engage in the digital economy of the 21st Century‚ leading to a lower standard of living across the country and a loss in international competitiveness. Moreover, the Task Force found that a thoroughly modernized payments system could save the Canadian economy as much as two per cent of GDP … Continue reading Moving Canada into the Digital Age | Government of Canada Report

Canada introduced their 2012 budget today.  There is an interesting reference to banking, copied here in totality.  There must be some reason for this.  It references external confusion about bank governance.  If anyone can contribute please chime in. Budget 2012 Clarifying Federal Jurisdiction Over Banking The Government will introduce a preamble into the Bank Act to clarify the intent that all banking activities throughout Canada be governed exclusively by the same high-quality federal standards that have served Canadians so well. Canadians benefit from one of the best-regulated banking sectors in the world. Canada’s banking regulatory framework rests on stringent prudential … Continue reading Government of Canada Budget 2012 seeks to clarify Federal Jurisdiction Over Banking