VTB, a Russia-based state-controlled bank with $280B in assets, began supporting transfers to China in yuan. Purchases of yuan in Russia have increased by 800% this year after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and ensuing sanctions.
Read MoreWave, a payments platform in Senegal, is in a price war with incumbent platform Orange Money. Wave offers a 1% fee on money transfers, while Orange Money has dropped its rates from 5% to 0.8%.
Read MoreBank of America has partnered with the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, New Jersey, to launch educational programs in local high schools. Students who complete the course will be extended job offers for positions related to emerging technologies by Bank of America.
Read MorePartners at accounting giant Ernst & Young are expected to approve a split of the company’s auditing and consulting businesses. The audit-focused company would retain the EY brand.
Read MoreLenders originated more than $100B in home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) in the first five months of 2022. This represents a 50% increase over the same period in 2021.
Read MoreThree Arrows Capital (3AC), a Singapore-based crypto hedge fund, filed for bankruptcy in July 2022. It owed more than $2.8B to creditors at the time it went bust, and is widely blamed for fueling the collapse of the crypto ecosystem.
Read MoreOn Friday, UBS announced that it had called off its acquisition of Wealthfront. UBS had been slated to purchase the robo-adviser for $1.4B.
Read MoreUS banks have closed 1,261 branches during the first six months of 2022. If closures continue at the same pace over the rest of the year, then this rate will represent a 15% decline compared to 2021.
Read MoreTexas Comptroller Glenn Hegar announced a list of ten financial firms that are now banned from doing business with state entities in Texas. Hegar said those firms, which include BlackRock, Credit Suisse, UBS, and BNP Paribas, “boycott” the fossil fuel sector, which is illegal under a 2021 Texas state law.
Read MoreIn early July, El Salvador-based payments startup n1co raised $12M in a pre-seed round. The fintech spinoff of super-app Hugo, n1co launched as its own company in early 2022.
Read MoreReporting by Bloomberg suggests the crypto sectors’ peak market cap of $3T may have been misleading. Crypto’s value now hovers around $1T.
Read MoreCorporate bankers have reported greater interest among business clients to move their supply chains closer to where their consumers are located. Clients are interested in both “onshoring,” which involves returning previously offshored activities to the business’ home country, as well as “near-shoring,” which moves those activities to nearby countries.
Read MoreSince the beginning of July, Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, and Tesla have added $1.3T to their combined market value. This has helped the Nasdaq Composite rise by 14.8% over that same time period.
Read MoreAlthough job growth accelerated in July, the Census Bureau reported that 12% of households were facing food insecurity, up from 10% at the beginning of 2022. The wealthiest 40% of households represent 60% of economic spending, while the poorest 40% represent 22% of spending.
Read MoreOver 30,000 tech workers have lost their jobs in the latest round of tech layoffs. Across industries, unemployment claims have reached an eight-month high.
Read MoreThe Financial Revolutionist is weekly newsletter and blog focused on the torrid pace of financial innovation. Today, thanks to the exponential rate of technological change, explosion in global trade and new regulations ushered in by the Great Financial Crisis, a new financial revolution is under way. In this battle, virtually every aspect of the greater financial services sector is subject to rigorous challenge. With the Financial Revolutionist, we are aspiring to create a boots-on-the-ground and highly opinionated assessment of important financial innovation developments in the past week.
