Fintech - Just the Glossary

I've had requests from a few people to just post up the Fintech Glossary separately from my last article, so here it is.

The Fintech Glossary

What follows below are terms and concepts that you need to bring into your lexicon to sound smart and wonderful when discussing this. There are plenty of online glossaries starting to appear so check them out. I have fished out some key terms to remember when discussing Fintech:

the Fintech world has got a hold of the term 'API' and is throwing it around with the fervour of Del Boy with a new French phrase he's overheard down the Nags Head.

• Agile - Oh yes! If there is an industry sector that was oblivious to the concept of agility, it is banking. Although you may have associated this term much more with modern day development, this has also to be thought of as the bedrock philosophy of all Fintech concepts in this new age.
• Accelerator - Similar (almost synonymous to an incubator) is an organisation that exists to aid (accelerate) the growth of fledgling startups especially when it comes to Fintechs.
• API - Once again we in IT recruitment should be familiar with the term Application Programming Interface, as a description of the myriad of development environments and platforms that are out there. But the Fintech world has got a hold of this term and is throwing it around with the fervour of Del Boy with a new French phrase he's overheard down the Nags Head. Of course the new world of digital payments will need apps and interfaces to seamlessly communicate with each other over a vast array of IoT and traditional devices. So developers with experience of creating for a multitude of API's alongside SOA and middleware experience will be all the rage.
• AWS and Azure: Both Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure will become influential platforms for the new financial systems going forward. So we may well find that the front-end of innovative technologies are housed here and the banks are reduced to handling clearing and compliance issues at the back end.
• BaaS - Blockchain as a Service : Microsoft is already out of the blocks on this in providing EthBaaS or Etherium Blockchain as a Service. Therefore the whole idea of blockchain applications and technologies being sold as neat products on cloud platforms will start to take a hold.
• Bitcoin - The first main stream cryptocurrency. Invented by the pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto. The jury is still out in 2017 as to whether this is the beginning of the end of traditional centralized currencies, or the world's biggest ponzi scheme and mass hallucination that we have all fallen into.
• Blockchain - A global array of computers that act as a large decentralized database that holds an encrypted digital ledger of transactions. Each computer holds a piece of the transaction to be recorded in an encrypted form, passing on the key to the next block in the chain, that then encrypts and passes on to the next block etc. Whence the 'blockchain'. In theory this is un-hackable, but at the very least this is incredibly secure and an almost instant way of setting up a transaction. See my previous article for more detail.
• Cryptocurrency - An encrypted currency created online which operates without the need for a central governing agency. Key examples are Bitcoin, Dash, Etherium, and Litecoin.
• Digital Wallet - An application or device that allows you to securely carry out financial transactions using an online platform.
• Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) – the software that creates a distributed ledger, a record of electronic transactions but which is encrypted and shared over a ‘distributed’ network. The essence of Blockchain.
• Digital Native - A person born in the digital age and who takes to all the above like a duck to water. They will in essence never heard of a floppy drive or video cassette.
• Ethereum - Another blockchain-based cryptocurrency.
• EthBaaS - See BaaS
• Hyperledger Fabric - Founded in 2015 within the Linux community, this is a move to advance cross-industry blockchain technologies. So rather than pushing a single blockchain standard, Hyperledger Fabric, in true open tradition, encourages open development across a community and the adoption of key standards over time.
• F/X - Foreign exchange. The market that deals with currency transactions and relative values.
• GDPR - General Data Protection Regulation. The recent EU initiative and policy aimed at strengthening the power of individuals with regards how their data is stored and shared with or without their permission.
• ICO - Initial Coin Offering. Similar to an IPO (Initial Public Offering) but this is a still controversial market offering that deals with launching new cryptocurrencies around the world. Countries like China and South Korea have now started to outlaw these. Even so, since the beginning of 2017 to September of the same year over $1.8 Billion dollars have been raised for new currencies.
• Machine Learning - The method whereby a Business Intelligence or Artificial intelligence system may acquire the information it needs to master a particular human attribute, skill or piece of knowledge. This essentially entails the computer to do the activity so many times that it learns every single scenario that is possible. These skills will be brought into the Fintech arena across the board.
• Omnichannel - The idea that the banking system will take on the challenge of delivering its services over a variety of APIs and devices (mobile, tablet, car, etc).
• Permissioned and Permissionless Blockchain - As the name implies, there will be two types of Blockchain, one that is private and one that allows public access to the chain.
• Roboadvisor - A computer system driven by very clever algorithms, with deep machine learning at its core, that will be able to advise you on the relative risks and rewards of particular investment vehicles.
• Smart Contracts - Contracts that are electronically held and controlled by the Blockchain so as to minimise human and regulatory delay in executing a transaction. The key point here is that smart contract technology appears to by moving faster than the regulations that should apply to them.
• Smart Property/asset - Don't assume that it is just electronic documents an contracts that can be encrypted or encoded with the ability to be tracked and monitored. Physical, tangible assets such as a car, a front door to a house, a mobile phone, a diamond ring can also be registered into the world of Blockchain. Now it get's interesting.
• Sidechain – A separate blockchain that is tied to an original one but which can operate separately and independently, if necessary being hidden and made accessible for the use of certain parties. 
• Tokenisation - Where the sensitive elements of data or a transaction are replaced by tokens. These tokens have no intrinsic value in and off themselves, but may be used to participate in a blockchain process.
• Unbanked - The population in the world that has no access to mainstream financial services, be they banks,loans or credit.

That's it folks!

Hope that's helped.

See you at the events!

Ayub Shaikh

Managing Director. Holistica Consulting.

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