Citywire: The WealthTech Show

In the last ever episode of the Wealthtech Show, we bring you some highlights from our favourite 2022 episodes. In this clip you hear Yaela Shamberg talk about how her and her team at InvestCloud tried to buy the domain name ‘iCloud’ from a stubborn anonymous owner. Listen to the episode to hear Ian interview a plethora of guests – from Matt Hancock to Jamie Bartlett, Myron Jobson to Mary Agbesanwa.

For those without huge backing or a long-established entrepreneurial brand, breaking into the wealthtech market is a monumental task. In this week's episode, we speak to Anton Padmasiri and Shri Krishansen of WealthOS, who are trying to do just that. There are many obstacles to overcome for wealthtech startups. Funding, networking, marketing and product development all need to be on point, and even then there are few guarantees. Anton and Shri talk us through it, while also highlighting why it's so important that we listen to new perspectives as we seek to improve the way we invest and manage our finances.

Terrie Smith, who led the development of the technology behind Google Pay and Apple Pay, joins us to discuss the evolution of wearable payments. Terrie believes that, in time, most of us will ditch our bank cards in favour of using digitally enabled jewellery, keyrings, or clothing. Terrie also discusses developments in verification technology, which will play a key role in paytech evolution. She outlines how this technology helps to verify the provenance of luxury items and explains how it is been used for the Golden Globe Awards.

Several pension schemes have expressed dismay at the 2024 launch date for the pensions dashboard, but why? In this episode, Jonathan Hawkins from Bravura explains that schemes have no excuses for not having their data ready, and also outlines that opacity has been in the best interests of those offering little value to customers. We also look at the good that dashboards can bring. Like never before, UK pension holders will be able to see what's really going on with their investments, and they'll be able to access it easily and in an understandable manner. While this means that some will learn that they've been ripped off, it also means that we are moving into an era of better pension schemes, and greater transparency for those who need it most.

It's been a testing year for tech investors. To give this comment some context, take note that the Nasdaq 100 is down almost 20% this year, due largely to the slashed valuations in big tech. Tech start-ups are not immune from the downturn either, with closer scrutiny being applied to business models and balance sheets. Dan Kemp, global CIO at Morningstar Investment Management, joins The Wealthtech Show this week to help us make sense of it all. Will the downturn be here for long? Do investors need to take action? Are we really in a recession? And which tech companies will survive, or even thrive, in the next few years?

Fintech is changing the way we engage with money. For those of us in financial services, it's also changing our careers. In this week's WealthTech Show, Mary Agbesanwa, fintech growth lead at Seccl and founder of the 'Now You're Talking' networking group, discusses the impact of embedded finance and the democratisation of finance - trends that will overhaul parts of our sector. We also discuss opportunities for ambitious millennials in fintech. Mary explains that this market puts people at the frontier of innovation, allowing them to play a key role in building the next generation of financial products and tools.

It would not be hyperbole to describe the OneCoin scam as a 'once in a lifetime' story for a journalist. When Jamie Bartlett started his investigation of it, he began a journey that would lead to the uncovering of a $4 billion Ponzi scheme, a hit BBC podcast, and the titular Missing Cryptoqueen, Dr. Ruja Ignatova, appearing on the FBI's top 10 most wanted list. In this episode of The Wealthtech Show, Jamie explains what's happened since the last episode of the podcast series while offering his thoughts on where Dr. Ruja might be hiding out. We also take some time to discuss his work on the dark web, and why crypto is unlikely to be the savvy criminal's currency of choice in 2022.

It really is as simple as that. In this episode intelliflo CEO Nick Eatock explains why tech savvy financial advisers outperform their peers by a country mile. Using intelliflo’s eAdviser Index, he makes it clear that great use of tech equals more clients, more revenue, and more profit. Eatock speaks from experience and knowledge. Having founded intelliflo 17 years ago, he’s grown the busines into a market leader. With great power comes great responsibility though – accordingly, he addresses the intellfilo outages from earlier in the year, offering context on the problems that unfolded.

Ever seen those laughable job ads that offer entry-level salaries in return for a minimum of five years’ experience? Well, the fintech industry isn’t quite so bad, but there is a bottleneck of talent. It’s caused in part by employers focusing on the most qualified, and by high barriers to entry for new starters. Nadia Edwards-Dashti, chief customer officer at Harrington Starr, explains why recruiters can help themselves and the industry by focusing on potential. She also discusses her book, FinTech Women Walk the Talk, which shares inspirational stories of industry leaders while outlining the distance yet to be travelled before gender parity is reached.

Asset managers oversee more than $100 trillion globally, but is the technology behind their propositions fit for purpose? Lorelei Skillman, chief communications officer for investment management platform Enfusion, flies in from New York to share her thoughts. You would expect an industry that manages trillions to be at the cutting edge but that is often not the case. Legacy technology persists and many fund managers aren’t able to track their investments in real-time. Is it time for investors to start asking serious questions about the tech being used by asset managers?

The UK is currently at the mercy of rising inflation, rents, household bills and taxes. Is there anything that technology can do to make peoples' financial situations more promising? In this episode we welcome Myron Jobson, senior personal finance analyst at Interactive Investor. We outline the situation at hand, while discussing how physical cash, apps, social media, FOMO and buy-now-pay-later can influence spending and saving habits.

Who'd have thought that digital assets, built on cryptographic algorithms, would attract 'crypto-bros' and 'to the moon' memecoins? In this episode, Katharine Wooller, managing director at crypto wealth platform Dacxi, discusses the culture of crypto and the impact on its potential adoption by regulated wealth and advice companies. We also discuss the FCA's recent involvement in the space, and whether the UK can truly become a hub for investors and crypto platforms. This is all going on amidst a brutal market downturn, which may shake out a lot of investors and coins. If you're wondering what's really going on beneath the moon shots and bravado, this is the podcast for you.

According to a Bitwise/ETF Trends 2022 survey, 94% of American financial advisers have recently been asked by clients about cryptocurrencies. This has created a gap in the market for providers, albeit one that carries unique and considerable risks. In this episode, Ben Cruikshank explains how he and his team at Flourish are helping US advisers to invest in crypto on behalf of clients. We discuss the Terra Luna debacle, the abundance of coins in the market, and how emerging regulatory frameworks can influence the future of DeFi.

Impact and ESG investing requires nuance and dedication, but technology can help make the whole process more manageable. In this episode, Darshita Gillies, CEO and founder of Maanch, explains how artificial intelligence is making it easier for fund managers and investors to understand what’s happening at the companies they invest in. It’s not just about screening companies for unethical and unsustainable behaviours. Darshita also explains how effective use of data is driving better engagement with companies across the world.

The WealthTech Show is all about what’s new and what’s changing. So too is Chris Marshall, host of the ‘Transitional Matters’ podcast and head of investment strategy at Dragon Investment Managers. In a conversation that spans the fourth industrial revolution, tech megatrends, and cryptoassets, Chris gives a multi-disciplinary account of what we should be looking out for as investors and professionals. It turns out that the fourth industrial revolution might not be an industrial revolution at all.

Scams, hacks, and outright fraud have grabbed the headlines in the early days of crypto. Erica Stanford, author of Crypto Wars, joins The WealthTech Show this week to tell us all about them. Despite Erica's knowledge of the dark side of decentralised finance, she's also an enthusiast and founded the Crypto Curry Club to create a forum for like-minded individuals. In this entertaining conversation, we also discuss holes in the UK Treasury's cryptoassets plans, the use of blockchain to support authoritarian regimes, and the many reasons why DeFi can be a force for good.

Good financial advice compliance is rarely front-page news, but It doesn't have to be boring. This week, Cathi Harrison explains how tech can give us greater confidence in our systems and processes. Are we misunderstanding what technology is adding to our compliance? And are the mergers and acquisitions in the advice market a good thing for clients? Cathi offers an honest perspective, while also explaining what we can learn, as well as what we shouldn't, from online wine investing.

Bella Caridade-Ferreira, CEO of Fundscape, is a leading figure in the UK investment platform market. In this week’s episode she explains why 2021 was a record year for inflows, despite a year dogged by a pandemic and lockdown. In this discussion, co-hosted by Citywire’s Chloe Meley, we cover the ins and outs of fund distribution, the impact of vertical integration in financial advice, technology advancements, and the reasons why demand for advice has accelerated.

As a teenager, Zechariah Schaefer made a six-figure return on an Ethereum investment which opened his eyes to the importance of financial planning for crypto holders. He now offers an advice service, based in Virginia, that is targeted at Gen Z and millennial clients. By focusing on an underserved market and helping people with their crypto affairs, Zechariah may well have created a viable blueprint for integrating DeFi into financial planning. A very worthwhile listen for any financial planner who gets asked about crypto.

Internet pioneer Roger Camrass returns to the WealthTech Show, to talk about the Web3, the evolution of technology, and how it will overhaul our working lives. According to Roger, we are approaching the dawn of the digital artisan, and nearing a time when people will spend their working lives in the metaverse. The consequences of this will be significant for many. Given Roger’s role in creating the internet, we also ask him about the UK government’s bid to make the nation a global hub for cryptoassets. His response may surprise you.

When Yaela Shamberg co-founded InvestCloud in 2012, there were people who told her that cloud computing was a passing fad. 10 years later, its digital platforms handle over $6 trillion in client assets. In this week's episode Yaela tells her story and discusses topics such as innovation, digital empathy, and gamification. Further, we discuss inspiration for new ideas, and the importance of diversity in tech and finance.

As former CIO of Hargreaves Lansdown, David Davies oversaw a major digital overhaul and headed up a team of over 400. He knows exactly what it takes to create the right culture for innovation and new ideas. Now operating as the founder and CEO of Navos Technologies, Davies can practice exactly what he preaches. In this episode of The WealthTech Show, he discusses how to structure your organisation for success, and offers his thoughts on the notion of someone in their 20s eventually joining the board at Navos.

Death doesn't need to be a morbid topic says Sam Grice, CEO of Guardian Angel. In this week's WealthTech Show we discuss the tech that makes it easier to handle death-related admin, while pausing to consider some weird and wonderful suggestions on how to leave a legacy. This discussion raises interesting questions, not just around tech but also around life planning. Are you prepared, in a practical sense, for your own death? And who, if anyone, will be able to access to your cryptocurrency and social media pages?

Online lead generation is valuable for financial advisers and prospective clients, but it's far from a flawless market. This week, Ian joins forces with colleague and reporter Laura Purkess, to chat with Contact State founder Alain Desmier. Laura has valuable experience here, having delivered scoops for New Model Adviser on murky practices in lead gen. Alain, meanwhile, devotes his career to helping companies and individuals use lead generation sites with confidence. Here, we separate the good from the bad, and try to make sense of the sites that connect people with professionals.

Thish De Zoysa founded Their Perfect Gift, a prepaid gift card company, after working in insolvency and seeing thousands of pounds of gift card purchases go to waste each year. In this episode, Thish tells his story in more detail, and shares the lessons that he’s learned about challenger banks, neobanks, and online payment innovations. The message is simple: technology is helping clients to access services that meet their own specific needs. If you run a financial advice or wealth business, you’d do well to be aware of what’s happening.

Matt Hancock, MP for West Suffolk and former Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, recently spoke in the Commons about the UK's suitability as a home to FinTech and cryptocurrency innovation. We invited him to The WealthTech Show to get a deeper understanding of what this means. This podcast covers individual rights to crypto ownership, the future of Web3, and the regulatory shifts that appear to have encouraged major investment in UK FinTech. Do people really understand cryptocurrencies? Can the big tech firms be effectively regulated? We discuss all of this and more.

Driverless cars are unlikely to appear anytime soon. That's the opinion of Patrick McGinty, an English professor at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, who has written a full syllabus for his students on autonomous vehicles. McGinty's upcoming novel, Test Drive, explores some of the questions provoked by the emergence of autonomous vehicles, while prompting us to wonder if they are genuinely a good thing. Besides offering his take on the auto sector, McGinty also explains a soul-searching journey to crypto-scepticism, which he has written about previously in his article Everywhere in Blockchains.

Can we really automate the role of the investment manager? And if we can, to what extent should we? In this episode of The WealthTech Show, we speak to Symon Stickney, CEO of Collidr. Symon is confident that Collidr is part of an exciting new wave of investment tech and says it’s ‘undeniable’ that AI and automation will eventually take over as the primary way in which portfolio management solutions are delivered. Whether you agree or not, this is a fascinating listen for any investor, professional or otherwise.

Even in 2022, wealth managers and financial advisers are using poorly integrated technology. It is a problem that creates needless delays and hassle, leaving us with one foot stuck in the twentieth century. This time on The WealthTech Show we speak to Ian Hutchinson and Emma Napier, both part of the business development team at Bravura Solutions. We look at the hassle caused by technology that does not communicate with the rest of your tech stack, and we discuss the potential for microservices to power bespoke and flexible propositions in advice and wealth.

Lavinia Osbourne, named as a LinkedIn Top Voice in 2021, has quickly become a renowned advocate for blockchain and its potential to create a better and more inclusive platform for financial services. In this episode, we look at the opportunity to educate ourselves about decentralised finance, as well as the possibility of lowering the barriers to entry for financial services. Further, we get Lavinia’s take on celebrity NFTs, such as those launched by William Shatner, Jay-Z and Lindsay Lohan.

Financial inclusion is a little misunderstood. On the surface it's a chance to make advice and wealth more inclusive and friendly, so it gets lumped in with philanthropy. This week we speak to Shan Millie, a member of TechNation's delivery panel, to look at the bigger picture. Sure, financial inclusion is ethical and righteous, but is it not also a massive opportunity for wealthtech adopters and innovators? With the right tech, can we create business models that are sustainable and profitable as well as inclusive?

London-based IFA Simon Bullock has spent his career building close connections with clients. Even so, he was a little surprised when one of them presented a tech solution to him, which could help him offer better investment and planning insights. We speak to Simon about what has happened since, and how he's devoted time and effort to refining the tool so that it works seamlessly for clients. If you're a wealth or advice professional with aspirations of building your own tech, this one is a must listen.

The money being spent on NFTs is ludicrous. But when you think about it, what’s new? Artist Eric Drass joins The WealthTech Show to discuss parallels between the physical and digital worlds, and what’s driving the demand for non-fungible tokens. Eric tells us about the NFTs that he’s created and sold, and the dubious ethics involved in using certain cryptocurrencies for the transaction. This is an open and lively chat about a confusing new trend, and an unexpected reflection on the relationship between art and capitalism.

Award winning journalist and broadcaster Misha Glenny joins The WealthTech Show for a 20-minute chat, following his presentation at the 2021 Wealth Manager Retreat. We touch upon cybercrime, decentralised finance, international relations, and cryptocurrency. Listen in to hear Misha’s thoughts on Bitcoin becoming a ‘speculative ponzi scheme’, how decentralised finance can help us spread risk, why the UK’s dated internet infrastructure may be problematic, and what leading organisations need to do to protect themselves from cyber threats.

We need to distinguish between today’s tech boom and the Dot-com bubble says Gregg Guerin, senior product specialist at First Trust. In this episode of The WealthTech Show, he explains what investors should know about emerging technology trends, while also considering the things we don’t need to know. We take a walk on the wild side too, touching upon Gregg’s attempt to purchase a basketball NFT at a Citywire event, as well as the beautiful world that could be created by cobots – the friendly cousin of regular robots. What else would you expect from this podcast?

As an angel investor, mentor, and guest lecturer, Simone Ishikawa has a keen interest in tech start-ups and their founders. In this podcast, she tells us what it takes for ambitious founders to achieve their goals. We also look at fintech as a force for good, and how new tech innovators are helping to reinvent financial services. As we dive into these topics, Simone gives us an outline of what this could all mean for wealth managers and financial advisers.

What makes you pick a mortgage broker? In this episode, Jinesh Vohra explains that lots of people pick someone because they seem nice, rather than doing proper due diligence. Jinesh, the CEO of recently launched app Sprive, is on a mission to educate and empower the UK public to pay off their mortgages more quickly. This means helping us to overpay properly, and it also involves an endless search for the best rates available. This episode might enlighten you, and it may save you a fair chunk of money in the long run too.

Georgia Stewart is the CEO of Tumelo, an investor engagement platform that lets you tell fund managers what they should vote for at company AGMs. In this episode of The Fintech Show, Ian asks if this is the start of a new era for ESG and relations with asset managers. The potential for change should not be understated. Since the roll-out of auto-enrolment in the UK, large swathes of the population could soon be empowered to tell fund managers what they want. Is this a catalyst for conflict? Maybe so, but Georgia also explains that Tumelo can build trust into the investment process too.

Automation and artificial intelligence offer exciting opportunities, but how do we harness them properly? In this episode we welcome Clara Durodie, a board member and consultant for international business leaders, who specialises in helping C-suite executives to properly integrate technology. Here, we look at the importance of ethics, and how we can avoid dystopian tech calamities such as those depicted in Terminator, The Matrix, and Wallace and Gromit: The Wrong Trousers.

Roger Camrass has a fascinating place in world history. As part of the team that designed the ARPANET in the 1970s, he is partly responsible for laying the foundations of the internet. In this episode, Ian asks Roger for his thoughts on what the internet has become, and what’s gone right and wrong. Roger also offers his vision of the economy of 2040 and how investors can invest for growth and dividends within the new paradigm. We also delve into demographic shifts and how they will reshape the world.

Fintech startups are not in short supply, and for every success story there are countless tales of near misses and abject failures. So how, as an investor, can you identify growing companies that will be the future stars of fintech? In this episode Ian speaks to Tim Levene, CEO of Augmentum Fintech, to find out. Augmentum became the first publicly traded fintech-focused venture capital company in the UK in 2018, and Tim has ample experience of investing in and working with innovators. If you want to learn about the ingredients of startup success, you are in the right place.

In this episode Ian speaks to award winning fintech innovation and strategy expert Kate Bohn. Drawing upon Kate’s experience in banking, and in promoting financial inclusion and accessibility, they discuss how to make finance more approachable for those who are excluded, while also delving into Kate’s experience of working with startup fintech firms in incubator programmes. An interesting stat to start. 20% of financial advisers claim not to have a single disabled client, yet research suggests that 46% of pension age adults have a disability. Are financial services really open to all?

For our season finale, Dr Bijna Kotak Dasani MBE, an executive director at Morgan Stanley, joins Ian for a conversation on how technology is shaping the diversity and inclusion profile of financial services. Research shows that many groups are underrepresented in technology and finance, and also that technology might be widening the gap between the rich and poor. We delve into that here, as well as the issue of human biases being baked into algorithms and artificial intelligence. Such biases have caused demonstrable injustices in the US legal system and healthcare, so what do they mean for financial services?

Behavioural finance has taken the financial planning world by storm. As advisers strive to better understand their clients, behavioural finance is helping uncover their true attitudes towards money, risk and financial goals. In this episode Ian chats with Neil Bage, director of behavioural insight at Be-IQ, to look at how technology, data, open banking and APIs can facilitate better conversations around client finances. Just as crucially, Neil indulges Ian’s decision to factor in the varying prices of a pint in London and Yorkshire.

David Stamp is a financial adviser with a difference. Not content with the inefficiencies involved in the advice process, he hired a tech team and spent over a decade automating and refining as much of the advice process as he could. The result? 2,000 clients on his book, and younger members of the team bemoaning that they only onboarded 200 clients in a single year. In this podcast, David tells Ian exactly how he did it, and how technology could usher in a new paradigm for financial planning.

Is technology making it easier to invest sustainably? In this podcast, Ian catches up with Gavin Francis, managing director of Worthstone, to ask how he’s helping advisers and wealth managers to assess funds and fund managers on their ESG and impact credentials. While Gavin’s elevator pitch belongs in the Burj Khalifa, he rightfully outlines suggestions for how people can build portfolios in line with the values of their clients.

The lockdown made advisers and wealth managers think twice about their tech stack, so in this episode, Ian invites NextWealth’s managing director Heather Hopkins to offer her take on the next advancements in advice and wealth tech. While the episode was recorded on Groundhog Day, this conversation helps outline why change and progression. This message is not exclusively for advisers and wealth managers, so we also shine a spotlight on product providers, and what they need to do in order to service their markets proficiently.

Institutional money has been rolling into cryptocurrency, so for episode one of the Tech Travels podcast, Ian speaks to James Butterfill, investment strategist at CoinShares. Most advisers and wealth managers will have discussed cryptocurrency with at least one client, so here we attempt to demystify an asset class that understandably grabs headlines and causes confusion. Not content with just discussing the biggest names in crypto, Ian also seeks advice on his Dogecoin holdings.