SIBOS 2015, Singapore – Day 1 Reflections

Spread across four floors of the Marina Sands Convention Centre in Singapore, SIBOS 2015 burst into life yesterday morning.

Whilst it is still early days, already there are a number of themes and topics emerging that appear to be forefront of the collective mind of the wide array of participants, speakers and exhibitors at this year’s event. A quick debrief with the SEPA Consultancy team at the end of day 1 highlighted the following:

  • The advancement of innovative and potentially disruptive new fintech products and services is clear to see and dominates many of the dialogues, on-stand demonstrations and presentations
  • There is a healthy ongoing dialogue (and tension) between technology driven solution providers and the significant banks about quite how and at what pace banks are willing and able to invest in implementing new technology solutions, particularly in relation to their core payments and transaction banking infrastructure
  • Capitalising upon technological transformation is seen as inevitable but there is still caution amongst many banks about embracing as yet unproven technologies and deciding which are the best horses to back
  • Discussions around the potentially disruptive technologies of blockchain and distributed ledgers have turned from a sideline whisper into a much more main stream, centre stage dialogue but with little real clarity about quite how such innovations will impact on banks and what they should do in response
  • Disappointedly the debate between bankers and technologists often still seems to miss any real focus on the end customer; it is often not clear as to precisely what problem the technology is seeking to solve in relation to generating new products, services and revenue opportunities for banks with their customers … examples and relevant metrics would help here
  • Discussions about real-time payments has also moved centre stage at this year’s SIBOS, driven by increasingly more stringent regulatory requirements, growing customer expectations for more real-time information and settlement and a need to demonstrate transparency on intraday liquidity and the management of liquidity risk

And from a SEPA Consultancy perspective, the most recent work we have undertaken on intraday liquidity continues to attract a lot of very keen interest from banks and potential partners, particularly in the use of our Intraday Liquidity Simulator to help banks top-slice data, model intraday scenarios, focus on the cost of liquidity, forecast outcomes and improve the utilisation of available liquidity.

More on these emerging themes as SIBOS continues to unfold over the next few days …