OneMarketData, LLC today announced that the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has selected OneTick Surveillance to deliver its core market surveillance and visualization system. The cloud-based service will provide the regulator with new tools to detect and investigate market anomalies and help to protect the integrity and orderly functioning of financial markets in the United Kingdom.  

The FCA selected OneTick Surveillance in a competitive tender process involving 15 providers. The delivered service detects potential cases of insider dealing, and market manipulation, and monitors for market disruption in real-time. The service will also help the FCA's Market Oversight team supervise the suspicious transaction and order reporting (STOR) regime.  

“We’re very proud to provide the FCA with a surveillance solution,” said Dermot Harriss, Senior Vice President of Regulatory Solutions at OneMarketData. “The service we’ve built for them is secure, programmable, will dynamically scale to meet increasing market volumes, and will allow the FCA to adapt to new risks to the integrity of our financial markets.”  

Created to be a modern, easy-to-use, cost-effective surveillance solution for small firms, OneTick Surveillance now provides a cross-asset, multi-regime solution for market participants of all sizes. Current customers include asset managers small and large, retail brokers, FCMs, banks, market makers, market operators, and regulators. The system gives users confidence they’ll meet their regulatory obligations even in periods of high volatility. It offers the scalability, reliability, simplicity, support, user customization, and ease of use that firms need, all in a cost-effective package. The cloud-based offering includes global equities, options, futures, and FX market data. It allows users to triage alerts in browser-based dashboards and design custom compliance workflows.

Ebury, the global financial technology company, is delighted to announce full-year results to 30 April  2023.  

Financials 

• Group revenues increased by 85% to £204 million (FY22: £110 million) 

• EBIDTA increased by 173% to a positive £16 million (FY22: negative £22 million) • Booked volume of transactions increased by 32% to £25.5 billion (FY22: £19.3 billion) • Average revenue per customer increased to £15.6k (FY22: £8.2k) 

• Total current active customers are 19,700, with a headcount of 1,700 employees across 40 offices worldwide 

• Santander’s investment in the Group now stands at 54% of the total shares 

Innovations 

• The rebuild of an even better API (Application Programming Interface)  

• A new indirect partnerships portal 

• More complex FX solutions to help keep businesses’ cash flow safe and their profit more  predictable 

Investments 

• A new global operations hub in Malaga and offices in Prague, Dublin, Stockholm, Santiago de  Chile, Montreal, Shenzhen and Leon 

• Technology and local experts in each region in areas such as Compliance, Risk, and HR Acquisitions 

• Bexs Banco de Cambio S/A, and Bexs Tecnologia da Informação Ltda in Brazil, provide cross border payments solutions, including FX in Brazil 

• Trans Skills Investment will form part of the Mass Payments division and provide payroll  processing capabilities in the Middle East 

• Prime Financial provides financial market advice and intermediary services in the treasury  sector and will provide the license to launch and grow a South African presence

Strategic overview 

The financial markets in FY23 were disrupted by several difficulties, such as the ongoing war in Europe,  and vulnerabilities in financial institutions. Despite these obstacles, Ebury maintained its dedication to investing in the business, leading to sustained revenue growth and enhanced financial performance during FY23. 

Ebury identified the key pillars to achieving its strategy and focused on ensuring the following was  implemented: 

• Activity: Ebury ensured teams were well managed and organized, maintaining morale and bringing activity up to and above historical levels. 

• High Value: Ebury prioritized and focused on its customers. The key was for everyone to take ownership for producing quality services and making sure new customers were brought in to grow the business. 

• Cross-selling: Ebury drove every opportunity to match the best products with its customers’ needs. 

During the year, Ebury put all the resources in place to ensure commercial and product strategies were aligned to have the best possible offering for its customers. 

Ebury sees continued growth opportunities in new vertical markets where the traditional banking sector has not yet focused, on increasing the client base, and new sectors where Ebury is still not present and where it is believed there is a significant growth opportunity. Ebury will also continue to make acquisitions to support this growth. 

The financial improvements in comparison to the previous year can be observed also when looking at the EBITDA growth of 173% to £16 million from negative £22 million in 2022, reflecting a positive change of £38 million and representing a significant improvement. The main reason for this positive shift is the operational leverage in the cost base, coupled with substantial revenue growth.  

Santander is Ebury’s biggest shareholder with 54% of the Company’s total shares issued, an eventual IPO  of the business is expected to see the company raise capital for growth while existing shareholders remain invested. 

Juan Lobato, Founder, and CEO of Ebury, commented: “I am eternally grateful to those who have helped build this business, and I know they share my pride when reflecting on where we have come from as well as sharing my excitement for where we can go next. Rising costs for both businesses and individuals, geopolitical instability, and vulnerabilities in financial institutions gave us all cause for concern, but we are in a stronger position than ever before. We have big ambitions and are exploring an  IPO of the business on the back of our strong financial and commercial performance to maximize Ebury's potential. We have no plans to slow down our amazing growth journey– in fact, we intend to speed  things up!” 

Provenir, a global leader in AI-powered risk decisioning software, today announced the appointments of Brice Barouch as Country Manager and Yasmine Ouirhrane, Business Development Manager, who will be joining the Provenir team in France to serve the growing number of financial services providers seeking AI-powered risk decisioning solutions. Based in France, Brice Barouch will lead Provenir’s operations in the region with Yasmine Ouirhrane responsible for creating go-to-market strategies and leading business development activities. 

Barouch brings more than twenty years’ experience in sales strategy and business development with a strong track record of driving new businesses and boosting sales revenue across the financial services industry. He’s held senior positions at Mirantis, Red Hat, Experian and Ayming.

Prior to joining Provenir, Ouirhrane served as a strategic seller at Varicent. She also brings years of experience defining marketing and commercial strategies, developing sales strategies, and identifying market opportunities. Both Barouch and Ouirhrane are located in France.

“Financial services providers and fintechs must deliver personalized customer experiences and meet consumer expectations for instant decisions to remain competitive,” said Corinne Lleti, Provenir’s Director General of Southern Europe. “Organizations are increasingly looking for our AI-powered risk decisioning platform to gather deeper insights from many types of data and make automated, hyper-personalized decisions. We are excited to welcome Brice on board to lead our French operations and Yasmine, who will play a pivotal role in addressing the rapidly increasing demand in the region.”

Provenir’s AI-powered decisioning platform enables faster, more accurate risk decisions across the entire customer journey. With purpose-built technology for data orchestration and risk decisioning processes across identity, fraud, and credit, the Provenir platform offers organizations embedded machine learning to provide the flexibility needed to iterate, expand and scale.

Wolters Kluwer Corporate Performance and ESG (CP & ESG) continues to integrate and extend its strong portfolio of financial and ESG solutions. This time the financial technology giant has announced it is integrating ESG reporting and disclosure functionality from CCH Tagetik into its Enablon ESG Excellence solution. This new functionality now empowers companies of all sizes to meet Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) and other requirements to report and disclose integrated ESG data alongside financial data.

Companies of all sizes are now being asked to consistently report their progress toward ESG commitments through a myriad of regulatory frameworks. Most notably, 50,000+ EU-based companies will be mandated to participate in the European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) by 2026. U.S.-based and foreign companies with subsidiaries in the EU will also eventually be expected to comply with CRSD disclosure requirements. “At its core, the CSRD will require impacted companies to integrate their ESG and corporate financial reporting through additional disclosures – and these new ESG disclosures must be auditable, just like financial data,” the company said in a statement. “These pressures are creating an urgent demand among financial and sustainability leaders for transformational technology that can help them collect, report, analyze and assure the accuracy of their complex, often siloed ESG data – with the same rigor that key stakeholders have come to expect for financial data.”

In response to these fast-evolving trends,  Wolters Kluwer CP & ESG has added ESG reporting and disclosure capabilities to its Enablon ESG Excellence solution. “The new functionality combines environment, health and safety (EHS) and ESG data collection and analysis expertise from the company’s industry-leading Enablon ESG Excellence solution with the market-leading reporting and disclosure intelligence capabilities of its CCH Tagetik ESG & Sustainability Performance Management solution,” a spokesman  said. “Enablon ESG Excellence now empowers sustainability and finance leaders to collect and connect operational and ESG data from various enterprise applications, from source to disclosure, in a single solution that supports all ESG-related functions across the enterprise.”

New functionality now available through the Enablon ESG Excellence solution helps sustainability and finance leaders to collect, unify, and validate ESG data from 100+ decentralized sources across the enterprise. It also allows users to map ESG data to frameworks and regulations – including CSRD, GRI, and SASB - and govern and monitor the ESG process from source to disclosure, with flexible, configurable workflow management. Leaders using the platform can now collaborate to track ESG performance and develop configurable ESG reports and presentations that combine narratives with numbers. They can also publish trusted, auditable ESG disclosures, based on traceable ESG data that aligns with regulatory requirements and meets the expectations of investors and stakeholders.

Karen Abramson, CEO of Wolters Kluwer CP & ESG, commented: “CFOs and sustainability leaders are quickly recognizing that spreadsheets and a patchwork of software applications – long the go-to resources for collecting and analyzing ESG-related data – no longer suffice for larger organizations that are committed to ESG. Just like our cloud-based corporate performance management technologies have brought clarity to the complexity of financial reporting and analysis over the past decade, Wolters Kluwer is now bringing digital transformation to the world of ESG reporting. Our new Enablon ESG Excellence solution enhancements prove that Wolters Kluwer is a market leader when it comes to creating agile platforms that unify ESG data management from source to disclosure.”

These continued enhancements to the Enablon ESG Excellence solution are the latest example of Wolters Kluwer’s leadership  in the ESG technology market. Just one month following the company’s March 2023 launch of its CP & ESG division, Wolters Kluwer introduced a new version of its Enablon Vision Platform for integrated risk management; and soon after added ESG standards to its award-winning, cloud-based TeamMate+ global audit expert solution portfolio. Wolters Kluwer has also recently earned recognition from independent research firm, Verdantix, as a leading, global provider of ESG software, and as the vendor with the most momentum among all participating firms in the Verdantix prestigious Green Quadrant report. Additionally, Wolters Kluwer was named a “Top Vendor” in the inaugural 2023 Environmental, Social, and Governance Reporting (ESG) Market Study, published by Dresner Advisory Services.

AnchorAt the start of the month Wolters Kluwer released its scheduled 2023 nine-month trading update. The company reiterated 2023 guidance, reporting nine-month revenues up 4% in constant currencies and up 5% organically. Recurring revenues (82% of total revenues) were up 7% organically and digital and services revenues (94% of total) were up 6% organically. Notably, the company’s expert solutions revenues (58% of total) grew 7% organically.Anchor Wolters Kluwer added that it “expects organic growth to pick up slightly in the fourth quarter and we expect the adjusted operating margin to improve year-on-year in the fourth quarter, resulting in a margin increase for the full year. Adjusted free cash flow in constant currencies is expected to increase in the fourth quarter.”

Last month the company celebrated 50 years of being listed on Euronext Amsterdam -  the world’s oldest exchange – as well as the 20 year anniversary of Nancy McKinstry being CEO.

Today Feedzai, the leading provider of financial crime and risk management solutions, has partnered with CoreCard, the gold-standard international provider of prepaid and credit technology solutions and processing services to banks and the financial technology and services market. 

The partnership will enhance CoreCard’s fraud detection and prevention capabilities to expand on its existing advanced spending control capabilities. The collaboration marks a significant milestone in CoreCard's commitment to providing comprehensive, cutting-edge services to its clients and reinforcing its position as the leading card management system and processing services provider. 

In today's rapidly evolving financial landscape, the ever-increasing threat of fraud poses a significant challenge for issuing program managers. CoreCard’s partnership with Feedzai will address this challenge by offering more advanced fraud detection and prevention capabilities, using intelligent AI to monitor for and flag suspicious transactions in nano-seconds with high degrees of accuracy. CoreCard's selection of Feedzai as a partner was guided by the high demands and expectations of its current and future clients. 

CoreCard will use Feedzai’s latest AI Card Transaction feature to support clients issuing credit, debit, and prepaid cards carrying the Visa, Mastercard, Amex, and Pulse logos. The easy to use interface provides a flexible case management system for CoreCard’s processing clients. The client-specific, real-time alerts on transaction and cardholder data enables CoreCard to add predictive model-based fraud detection capabilities. The integration allows CoreCard to manage events quickly and effectively protect cardholders while minimizing friction at the point of sale.

The partnership enhances CoreCard's longer-term strategy of extending its issuer processing capabilities to include a wider range of value-added services, providing a seamless route to a successful card program. 

Brett Barrett, VP of Sales, Feedzai said: “As criminals become more sophisticated and fraud levels rise across the globe, issuers have a huge role to play in protecting consumers. That’s why our partnership with CoreCard to provide its clients with the most advanced fraud detection solutions available is so important. This collaboration underlines our commitment to delivering cutting-edge technology and reinforces our position as a trusted partner in the fight against financial crime."

Mark Raleigh, COO of CoreCard, comments: “Feedzai’s track record of successfully delivering services to clients and its customer centric approach made them the ideal vendor. The partnership with Feedzai signifies a significant step forward in our commitment to enhancing the security and reliability of our issuer processing services. By integrating Feedzai's state-of-the-art fraud detection capabilities into our offerings, our clients will be able to protect their cardholders while streamlining their operations."

New research conducted by money-saving app and retailer marketing platform ZIPZERO has found that young people are becoming disproportionately alienated by digital advertising due to bombardment, excessive intrusion, and/or deception.

It revealed that 33% of young people (aged 18-34) have been a victim of a scam or fraud as a result of clicking on an online ad, significantly higher than the 18% average across the UK.

ZIPZERO, the app transforming data into cash rewards for consumers, commissioned new research to uncover Britons’ experiences of online advertising. 

It found that 60% of young people feel overwhelmed by the level of online advertising they are exposed to. This comes as 21% have reduced social media usage, while 13% have quit social media altogether, both due to excessive advertising.

Moreover, three in five (59%) young people have deleted an app in the past due to excessive or invasive advertising, and 20% have abandoned an email account in favor of a new one due to spam email ads.

Young Britons were also more likely to think that their devices were listening to them to inform targeted advertising, with 63% holding this belief, compared to 56% on average across the UK.

Mohsin Rashid, CEO of ZIPZERO, said: “The barrage of online ads that young people are exposed to every day have them running for the hills. Indeed, the irony is that supposedly ‘targeted’ advertising is anything but; instead, it is but a constant deluge of overwhelming, invasive, and largely irrelevant content.

“The fact that so many have fallen victim to scams or fraud due to online ads is a criminally clear indication that current advertising standards are failing to safeguard young people. In the name of advertorial insights, Big Tech – or should I say Big Brother – has for too long been left to pry and pillage people’s personal information, with next to zero transparency or accountability.

“Britons deserve ethical, non-invasive, and responsible marketing practices; these statistics must serve as a wake-up call for Big Tech, advertisers, and regulatory bodies alike. Effective advertising is no justification for violating consumer boundaries, and the wellbeing of young people should outweigh any bottom line.”

Co-branded credit card provider Imprint has raised $75 million in Series B funding.

In an ever-changing digital environment, merchants and consumers are looking for more seamless, secure, and innovative checkout experiences. Now, the trusted technology that uses your face to unlock your phone or tablet can soon be used to help consumers speed through in-store checkout thanks to a strategic partnership between Mastercard and NEC Corporation.

Through a signed Memorandum of Understanding the partnership will implement NEC’s face recognition and liveness verification technology, and Mastercard’s payment enablement and optimized user experience to drive global scale.

"As retailing environments continue to evolve and choices in ways to pay rapidly expand, biometric solutions offer a seamless, quick and secure checkout, without needing to unlock a phone or insert a PIN,” said Ajay Bhalla, President, Cyber and Intelligence Solutions, Mastercard. "This partnership with NEC will enable us to bring exciting new biometric payments to customers in countries across Asia Pacific and lead the world in safe and convenient checkout experiences."

"By utilizing NEC's world-class face recognition technology, the new payment system will provide both security and convenience," said Takao Iwai, Corporate Senior Vice President and Managing Director, Financial Solutions Division, NEC Corporation. "By collaborating with Mastercard, which has payment assets used around the world, NEC will provide a new payment experience, aiming to create a world where everyone can use digital technology with safety."

Consumers worldwide are embracing the convenience and security of biometrics. In fact, 82%1 of consumers in Asia Pacific use at least one form of biometrics already, with the average consumer reporting they use three types. Likewise, businesses are embracing biometric authentication. By 2025, biometrics will authenticate over $3 trillion in payment transactions.

Mastercard’s Biometric Checkout Program, which launched with a pilot in Brazil last year, is set to transform in-store payments with consumers simply smiling or waving to pay. The Program provides participants with a framework that addresses security, biometric performance, data protection and privacy requirements, for financial institutions, merchants, and technology providers within the ecosystem. NEC is an early enrollee of the Program.

Merchants can benefit from shorter lines, increased security and more hygienic conditions. Additionally, loyalty programs can be integrated in the checkout system, for faster more tailored offers at purchase as part of any successful business strategy. Biometrics can play a key role in helping merchants build a more engaging relationship with their customers while driving sales.

Mastercard and NEC will showcase this latest payment experience at Singapore Fintech Festival from November 15 to 17th.

British Business Investments, a wholly-owned commercial subsidiary of British Business Bank plc, today publishes its Annual Report and Accounts for 2022/23.

Key highlights include:

• 19 new portfolio commitments to new and existing delivery partners at a total value of £386m
• In its ninth year of operation, British Business Investments’ cumulative commitments now exceed £3.8bn
• A 6.3% five-year adjusted return on average capital employed, delivering a pre-tax profit of £38.1m in 2022/23
• Support for more than 18,000 smaller businesses across the UK, more than 84% of which are outside of London

Louis Taylor, Chair, British Business Investments, said: “In challenging economic times, the importance of British Business Investments’ role has been demonstrated once again. Against an uncertain backdrop, we have continued to support the UK economy by bolstering the finance options that are available to smaller businesses, making new commitments totaling £386m in the past financial year. We have also generated a strong financial return for the British Business Bank Group, with profit before tax of £38.1m, and a 6.3% five-year adjusted return on average capital employed.”

In 2022/23, British Business Investments continued to deliver strongly against its four strategic objectives:

1. Increasing the supply of finance to smaller businesses across the UK: As of 31 March 2023, British Business Investments had made total commitments of over £3.8bn to finance providers to support funding to UK smaller businesses since its inception in 2014. New commitments in 22/23 were £386m which, combined with third-party capital investing alongside us, means that total funding of almost £1.3bn will be made available to the UK market.

2. Helping to create a more diverse finance market: British Business Investments made 19 commitments, nine of which were to new delivery partners. This increases cumulative portfolio investments to 115, and 66 current delivery partners.

3. Identifying and helping to address regional imbalances in access to finance: British Business Investments is providing funding to more than 18,000 businesses, more than 84% of which are based outside of London.

4. Managing taxpayers’ money efficiently, whilst generating a commercial rate of return: British Business Investments reported a 6.3% five-year adjusted return on average capital employed, delivering a pre-tax profit of £38.1m.

British Business Investments supports the development of more diverse debt and equity finance markets throughout the UK. To increase the choice of finance for smaller businesses, British Business Investments provides funding through a wide range of finance providers – including peer-to-peer lenders, small-cap private debt funds, challenger banks, asset finance providers, equity funds-of-funds and regionally-based early-stage investors.