Events Wrap Ups
Canright Communications Co. writers cover most Chicago Payment Forum meetings in our FinTech Rising blog. ChiPay Forum presentations have generated a lot of great payments trends and education content over the years, in addition opportunities to meet highly knowledgeable Chicago payments professionals.
Click the headlines below to read the complete post on FinTech Rising.
New Horizons in Cryptocurrency
May 10, 2022
What’s on the horizon for cryptocurrency and blockchain technologies? It’s a question on a lot of people’s minds, and there’s a potential for more than a good profit margin for financial professionals who come to the right answers: a potential paradigm shift in payments, investing, and the way we use the internet itself could be on the line.
Could a Central Bank Digital Currency be in the Cards for the U.S.?
March 13, 2022
President Biden called last week for an urgent, government-wide focus from the U.S. into the research of a potential Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) in an Executive Order. It’s a move that’s been a long time coming—American efforts in the space have lagged far behind some other countries, including China, which has already launched a pilot for its own digital yuan.
Tech Talk: Digital Assets and Cryptocurrency: A Breakout Year
February 10, 2022
The Chicago Payments Forum partnered with 1871 and its hub88 and inspireHER TECH to explore what 2022 may have in-store for digital assets, including how likely the record pace of investment in digital assets companies will continue. What kinds of institutional projects can we expect to see? As well as, what can we expect from federal and state regulators this year?
Note: In retrospect, we might call it a Blowup Year, but the educational value of the talk persists.
Stablecoin: A Faster Future?
October 16, 2021
Could stablecoin be an idea whose time has arrived? The industry remains niche in terms of overall value, but as more competitors test the ground to enter the field – including large central banks in some countries like Sweden – the conversation has rapidly developed into what could be suggested to be an inevitability.
FinTech Innovation: It’s About People
August 7, 2021
FinTech innovation has driven a revolution in financial services that has, over the past year, truly come to the foreground as digital banking increasingly becomes the trusted norm for many customers. From groundbreaking new services in mobile payments, digital currencies, blockchain, peer-to-peer lending, and much,, innovation has long been an important focal point in the digital transformation of financial services.
Navigating Startups from Seed to Series B
April 10, 2021
The allure of startups has rarely seemed stronger. Much of the tech industry is built on the backs of multi-billion dollar giants that came out of the startup space, and while tech appears to be in the middle of another bubble, the lure of relatively free-flowing investor money is hard to ignore.
Innovation and Regulation: Building Better International Payments
March 6, 2021
International trade and commerce are a major piece of the payments industry, with volume only increasing year over year as digital options further connect the globe – and yet, many of the systems that businesses and retail consumers alike rely on to make these payments remain too slow, too complex, and expensive.
From Hype to Investment: The Changing Face of Blockchain
August 11, 2020
Blockchain was quite the buzzword just a couple of years ago; tracking alongside bitcoin, it generated quite a bit of hype and more than a few headlines before, for many financial professionals, seemingly fading back into the background. While those days of big headlines and market-redefining hypothetical use cases may be over, now, blockchain hasn’t gone anywhere. Investors have taken notice of the technology, and the new developments taking shape in the emerging field of digital assets are very real.
Emerging Cannabis Market Presents Opportunities for Payments Trailblazers
July 28, 2020
In January 2020, Illinois joined 10 other states in the country (along with the District of Colombia) by legalizing recreational marijuana. While this has presented an immediate business opportunity that many have taken advantage of, the continued federal ban on the drug has led to unique challenges for both business owners seeking ways to process payments, as well as for financial institutions and partners who are interested in working in the space. Members of the Chicago Payments Forum tackled the subject in a recent roundtable meeting, noting both the potential – and still very significant risks – the new market holds.
Chicago Payments Startups Tackle the Tough Problems
March 3, 2019
Solutions presented at the February Chicago Payments Forum meetup focused on credit-card fraud, accounts receivables, merchant access, and consumer identity. Four Chicago-based startups presented to about 50 professionals with interests across the payments ecosystem, including bankers, startup founders, investors, lawyers, and marketers.
U.S. Faster Payments Present and Future
October 12, 2018
Everyone wants to get paid faster. As faster payments systems come online from central banks around the world, the United States lags with an aging, efficient, and relatively slow payments infrastructure. That’s changing as consumers come to expect payments to work as immediately as commerce in general. The Chicago Payments Forum hosted two startups providing solutions for immediate payments at Chicago law firm Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg on Wed. Oct 10. The forum runs meetups dedicated to building a community of payments professionals in Chicago.
Bitcoin: The Payments Elephant
December 7, 2017
The Chicago Payments Forum met at the Accenture Innovation Center to discuss payments developments in 2017 and how they will affect the business in 2018 and beyond. During the week, bitcoin hit a record price of $16,000. In putting together the overview, it occurred to me that right up front we had to address the elephant in the room: bitcoin.
Mobile Payments Past and Future
August 31, 2017
More than 50 people showed up on a lovely late-summer Chicago evening to listen to me and two panelists from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago talk about “Mobile Payments: Looking Back, Looking Forward.” We were thrilled at the turnout, as was co-sponsor FinTank. In the first of what will be an ongoing series, participants got a sense of the development of mobile payments in the United States today, including:
√ The challenges of two-sided markets or networks and the institutional and financial forces that inhibit change
√ The industry’s reliance on 40-year-old infrastructure
√ The Federal Reserve-sponsored faster-payments initiative that seeks to foster innovation