Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 38

Big Risks,
Major Opportunities
Bitcoin, the blockchain-based cryptocurrency, has been
the darling of investors over the past few years. And while
there have been concerns about theft, price volatility and
an economic bubble, the enthusiasm for the underlying
technology is palpable. Blockchain's potential across a
number of industries is already being tested and POCs
developed. For banks and ﬁnancial services institutions,
this presents a massive opportunity to modernize - and a
long-term threat to their monopoly as the guarantor of
economic transactions.
But blockchain is just one link in a chain of emerging and
disruptive technologies which threaten to upend the
established economic system and severely impact the
bottom lines of ﬁnancial institutions. There is a growing
fear that the ramiﬁcations may be more than this, that the
next generation of customers may opt out of the system
all together. This has led to a huge churn within top
decision-making bodies of banks and ﬁnancial
organizations, with many asking what they need to do to
stay relevant to their customers' needs.
A massive host of new capabilities, powered not only by
blockchain but by such technologies as artiﬁcial
intelligence, robotics, big data analytics and more, are
38

emerging that oﬀer customers and businesses new
opportunities to sustain and grow their businesses. At the
same time, in this hyper-connected and hyper-regulated
business environment, there is constant pressure on
security, integrity and institutional trust. These myriad
factors place ﬁnancial institutions in a unique, if
unenviable position: to be both drivers of a generational
change in technology and its applications, while also
contending with ampliﬁed governmental and consumer
scrutiny. These changes call into question the
fundamental values and principles of an organization, and
require companies to also focus on building strong
internal cultures that can be sustained under these
massive changes.
This issue has featured diﬀerent tools, techniques and
strategies that can be employed by ﬁnancial services and
allied industries to survive and thrive in these disruptive
times. They provide industry change managers, including
CIOs, CDOs and engineering heads, ways to build a
consensus on what can be a positive, long-term approach
to digitization.
We have seen some common themes running through the
articles in the issue:

Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services

Contents
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - Cover1
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - Cover2
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 1
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - Contents
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 3
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 4
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 5
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 6
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 7
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 8
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 9
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Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 11
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 12
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Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 38
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Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - 40
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - Cover3
Straight Talk Special Issue: Financial Services - Cover4
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https://magazine.straighttalkonline.com/issue1
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