ING Bank announced today  the initial release of its Zero-Knowledge Range Proof (ZKRP) solution at the inaugural Enterprise Ethereum Alliance Event in Amsterdam. The technology signals a major addition to blockchain technology and will help overcome one of the biggest obstacles to financial services in using blockchain technology: improving confidentiality in a public ledger. The ZKRP solution has been internally developed by the ING blockchain team and has demonstrated significant efficiency improvement. 

Pre-Budget hints that Chancellor Philip Hammond is eyeing tax and VAT raids on freelancers and microbusiness in the impending Budget would lead to “an epic disaster for the tech sector and economy if they are implemented” warns Lee Murphy, the CEO and founder of Pandle, the cloud accountancy software for small businesses.

Lee Murphy, an accountant and tech entrepreneur, said: “The British economy over the past 20 years has been a huge success story, creating millions of extra numbers of jobs and sustaining growth in the face of a pretty difficult global economic background. 

IHS Markit, a world leader in critical information, analytics and solutions, today announced the launch of new optical character recognition (OCR) and artificial intelligence (AI) functionality to digitize the tax validation and due diligence process.  The integration of these new capabilities is available through CTI Tax Solution’s Mandatory Document Due Diligence (MD³_®) and Common Reporting Standard (CRS) due diligence modules.

Databricks, provider of a leading Unified Analytics Platform and founded by the team who created Apache Spark(TM), today announced it has become a partner with Microsoft to expand the reach of its Unified A

Between November 2016 and November 2017, Bitcoin saw its market-cap increase by 1034% to a record breaking value of $128,982,906,067 on coinmarketcap.com. November 2017 also saw Bitcoin hit a new all-time high against the British Pound and US Dollar, with xe.com valuing a single bitcoin at £5889.18 and $7720.66 respectively.

With bitcoin’s market expanding, value increasing, and its near-global adoption favoured for its decentralised system, it’s no wonder that more people are looking to earn, spend, and even gamble with the cryptocurrency.

KnowBe4, Inc., the provider of the world’s most popular security awareness training and simulated phishing platform, shares an insider’s perspective of cybersecurity trends to expect in 2018. The list of six predictions are founded on the company’s deep insight into threats that organisations experience today and should expect tomorrow.

BNP Paribas, a leading European provider of banking and financial services, and GTS,  a New York-based global electronic market maker, today announced a strategic collaboration marking a new era for banks and electronic market makers.  This collaboration will enable BNP Paribas to leverage GTS' trading and technology capabilities with the goal of providing BNP Paribas's clients with deeper liquidity, tighter spreads and further improved pricing in the US Treasuries secondary market.  

Financial firms and their senior management teams currently face an uphill battle to be ready for the vast overhaul of European market rules that come into force on January 3^rd with MiFID II. 

Research from leading communication technology business, TeleWare, reveals that seven in ten (71%) financial firms impacted by the directive are upgrading current IT infrastructure to improve business efficiency. Nearly two thirds, (66%) have invested in people training and almost half (47%) are recruiting new members of staff.

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 New research from Celent (commissioned by Finastra) which examines the future transformation of capital markets, identifies six key drivers of change over the next five years to 2022:

 Xpress Money, one of the most dependable money transfer brands in the world, has announced a strategic partnership with Travelex, a leading global expert in foreign exchange and cross-border international payment solutions, to provide instant global money transfers in its physical stores. With over 100 Travelex locations, including ones at prominent airports, the new partnership means that Xpress Money can expand its operations and customer base in the UK.