The referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU, a tumultuous US presidential campaign and ongoing events in the Middle East have once again revealed insecurities in the global economy as markets fluctuate sharply on an almost daily basis. Many markets in the Asia-Pacific region too, are experiencing a slowdown as manufacturing hubs have started to move to other, cheaper countries. Unfortunately, these types of macro-economic events can have a reverberating impact on industry because international supply chains are often the first to be affected.

On March 9, 2017 the first large conference for Blockchain developers and businessmen – Blockchain & Bitcoin Conference – will be held in Tallinn. Representatives of leading IT companies, authors of startups and everyone who is interested in Blockchain technologies will come together.

Technology will continue to be one of the biggest disrupting forces in the banking and finance sector in 2017, with innovations such as blockchain, chat bots, robo-advice and virtual reality finally breaking through. In 2016, we saw the time it takes to go from breakthrough technology to mass market application reducing as technology disruptors reshaped big business practice, and this breakneck pace doesn’t show signs of abating as we enter a new year.

SimCorp, a leading provider of investment management solutions and services for the global financial services industry, today announced that SEB, a Swedish financial services firm, has selected SimCorp Dimension as its new back office platform, including transaction processing, reconciliation, settlement,accounting and derivatives processing.

I join in several different podcasts globally, and am a regular on a few. One of those is FinTech Insider, who just recorded an episode that will be released in three parts on December 26, 27 and 29.  The reason is that it is in three parts is that there were seven of us in the room: David Brear, Simon Taylor, Jason Bates and me – the hosts; and three special guests:

GMC Software (GMC), the award-winning leader in Customer Communications Management (CCM), announced today that it is listed as a Representative Vendor in Gartner’s September 2016 Market Guide for Rapid Mobile App Development Tools. The Gartner Market Guide lists 34 representative vendors offering solutions in this market. GMC Software is the only CCM vendor included.

BlackRock Capital Investment Corporation (or “BCIC”) (NASDAQ:BKCC) today announced that Michael Zugay, Head of Investments for BlackRock’s US Private Capital Group, has been named Chief Executive Officer of the company. Further, James Keenan, Global Head of Fundamental Credit at BlackRock, has been appointed as the new Chairman of the Board. The appointments of Zugay and Keenan follow the decision of Steven Sterling to leave his executive role, while remaining a Director for BCIC. The changes will be effective January 1, 2017.

Cardlay, a front-end Card Management Platform and Cardholder application, is announcing the release of its white label solution for banks and a $4 million funding round from private investors. The company is now forming partnerships with top-tier banks to serve as a front-end platform, assisting in optimization of their corporate account management and capitalizing on existing portfolios.