NatWest Group has signed agreements with three payment providers – TrueLayer, GoCardless and Crezco – to offer Variable Recurring Payments (VRP) as a new and convenient payment option for businesses and consumers. Today’s announcement, an industry first, means that NatWest Group will be the first UK bank to go beyond the requirement for banks to provide VRP in support of ‘sweeping’ – the automatic transfer of money between two accounts belonging to the same person.

Spectrum Markets, the pan-European trading venue for securitised derivatives, announced today its product offering has widened to include cryptocurrencies as an underlying, with turbo warrants on Bitcoin and Ethereum now available.

The new products expand Spectrum’s existing suite of Turbo24s and allow brokers to offer their clients long or short leveraged exposure to the price of the two most popular cryptocurrencies.

Financial services – and banks in particular – have faced trust issues for years, driven in part by painful service experiences, often disproportionate fees, and an unnecessary propensity for jargon. Let’s not forget the scandals that seem to rear their ugly heads every few years or so - clearly there are plenty of reasons for customer dissatisfaction.

New research from American Express highlights that - after a challenging few years - small business leaders increasingly recognise the importance of a healthy work-life balance and downtime to improving their personal wellbeing as well as vital business leadership skills. 
 

Vyta Group, Ireland’s leading secure IT recycling company, today announces the acquisition of Essex-based IT disposal company FGD, following an £11M investment from MML Growth Capital Partners Ireland (MML). The investment from MML will give it a minority shareholding in the Group.

Xceptor, the financial sector’s leading no-code software platform for data automation, today announced the appointment of Pete Daffern as Non-Executive Company Chair. Pete brings over 30 years’ experience within the technology sector, having successfully grown numerous software businesses, including the creation of three companies which achieved market capitalisations of over $10BN.

Worldline, a global leader in payment services, and Algoan, a leading credit scoring provider, today announced a collaboration agreement to jointly develop a next-level credit assessment solution to help lenders and services providers make better credit decisions. This service is based on best-in-class APIs & machine learning, making use of open banking transaction data.

Financial Risk Solutions (FRS), provider of investment administration software to asset owners and life and pensions companies worldwide, today announced Generation Life, an Australian leading provider of tax-effective investment bonds, has launched an investment-linked lifetime annuity solution using FRS’s Invest|Pro™ as a key component of Generation Life’s technology supporting the lifetime annuity.

How do you do trust someone you can’t meet in person? It’s a question organisations have been grappling with in the age of the internet, KYC requirements, and the rapidly escalating costs and consequences of identity fraud.

“Enter biometrics with liveness detection, a state-of-the-art solution that onboards customers securely, easily, and quickly,” says Lance Fanaroff, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer, iiDENTIFii – leader in remote biometric digital facial authentication and automated onboarding technology.

Payful, a new startup dedicated to eradicating late invoice payments across B2B transactions has secured its place on Enterprise City’s ‘Exchange Support Scheme’. As part of the selection, the fledgling Manchester-based FinTech will now move its offices to the city’s famous Bonded Warehouse.