We are excited to announce that SWIFT and SEPA withdrawals and deposits  have already been implemented and fully functional in the Exscudo  Channels App. The function is available worldwide with the exception of the US and select countries. Thanks to the SEPA and SWIFT support our customers are able to top up their Channels balance by making a bank transfer in Euro, USD or any other fiat currency. The feature allows  users to hold fiat funds in a secure application as well as transfer fiat to channels and easily purchase cryptocurrency right from the app. Currencies, currently supported for purchase in Channels are: EON, TUSD, OMG, LTC, DASH, QTUM, ZEC, CTKT, EURT, USDT, XMR and EUR.

Exscudo aims to give its customers the ability to store their wealth in the most advanced financial system up-to-date. This can be done with a simple SEPA or SWIFT transfer from the user’s bank account to the Channels App. Then you can keep your money safely inside the Channels mobile wallet, protected by the power of a blockchain.

The system allows users to hold their assets in any currency they would like, be it digital or traditional, while retaining the ability to spend their funds at any traditional retailer. Users can not only hold and send funds, but also exchange currencies directly within the app. Thus exscudo clients are able to enjoy the level of privacy and security provided only by the blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies while retaining all financial flexibility in the way to spend or manage their funds.

The company plans to further enhance the Channels functionality by issuing its own banking cards which will deliver the highest cashback of  up to 10 percent on select offers and allow to make payments with any  currency at any retailer in the world and addition new currencies available for direct exchange in the app.

Being developed by an innovative company Exscudo, Channels is aimed to not only create a more technologically advanced and reliable alternative to traditional banking, but also develop a new-generation financial management ecosystem with unrivaled levels of security and privacy that  will be accessible to anybody, thanks to it’s free core featureset, low fees and extra fast transaction speeds.

Channels is available for download here: https://go.onelink.me/PdtN/76df84c9

QuantHouse, the leading independent global provider of end-to-end systematic trading solutions including innovative market data services, algo trading platform and infrastructure solutions, today announced that QuantHouse and ARQA Technologies have been awarded ‘Best Alliance or Partnership’ at the 2019 Waters Technology Sell-side Awards.

The Sell-Side Technology awards recognise the leading technologies and third-party vendors in their area of expertise, through an auditable and transparent methodology developed and managed by Waters Technology and determined by an esteemed panel of judges.

As part of the QuantHouse API Ecosystem store, both companies partnered in 2018 to offer an OMS and advanced trading solutions as a fully managed service to sell-side market participants across Europe delivering access to over 150 equity and derivatives markets. This partnership was a direct result of the high demand witnessed for ARQA Technologies’ QUIK OMS - an order management system for sell-side companies. The joint solution expanded ARQA Technologies’ reach in Europe using QuantHouse’s backbone infrastructure and market connectivity.

This collaboration between QuantHouse and ARQA contains two elements. One, to feed QUIK OMS with fast, well-normalised and truly global market data and the other, to host QUIK OMS at QuantHouse’s data centre in London. These two elements enable clients to use QUIK OMS as a service and simplify connectivity to exchanges and execution brokers that are members of the QuantHouse API Ecosystem store.

Stephane Leroy, Business Co-Founder and Chief Revenue Officer, QuantHouse, said, “QuantHouse is delighted to be recognised by Waters Technology for our joint offering with ARQA Technologies. End-clients benefit from a fully hosted solution that delivers a best-in-class OMS together with seamless market data and exchange connectivity integration. This approach makes the solution much easier to deploy than a traditional client-side implementation and allows clients to innovate rapidly and cost-effectively by connecting to our API Ecosystem store.”

Roman Anokhin, director, ARQA Technologies, said, “By partnering with QuantHouse, we are able to extend the reach of our services to yet more firms looking to benefit from easy to integrate, on demand services. Furthermore, as part of the QuantHouse API Ecosystem store, this new service has the capability to scale to match trading and performance requirements for regional players through to large investment banks.”

KKR announced that it has become a founding signatory to the Operating Principles for Impact Management, a new market standard for impact investing introduced by the IFC, a member of the World Bank Group. KKR joins 59 other signatories, collectively representing over $350 billion in assets invested for impact, in their commitment to managing their impact investments in accordance with these Principles, which are meant to bring greater transparency, credibility, and discipline to the impact investing market.

IFC led the development of the Principles, in collaboration with leading asset managers, asset owners, asset allocators, development banks, and financial institutions, following a three-month public stakeholder consultation. The Principles aim to create clarity and consistency regarding what constitutes managing investments for impact in order to bolster confidence in the market.

Ken Mehlman, Co-Head of KKR Global Impact, joined fellow signatories in Washington, DC, today for the global launch of the Principles. He commented: “For the last decade, we have sought to learn from leaders in sustainability as we have made our journey. The IFC has been leading impact investors for many years and we look forward to learning from their thinking, as well as from other stakeholders who are committed to investing for positive impact and shared value.”

Over the last decade, KKR has been a leader in driving and protecting value throughout the firm’s private markets portfolio through thoughtful Environmental, Social and Governance (“ESG”) management, as well as measuring and reporting on performance to the public and investors. The firm also has a history of investing in businesses that promote sustainable solutions to societal challenges.

This experience of responsible investment combined with a changing landscape of global challenges led to KKR’s decision to create a dedicated Global Impact business in 2018. KKR’s Global Impact strategy focuses on identifying and investing behind businesses with positive social or environmental impact that measurably contribute solutions to one or more of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. KKR’s alignment with the Operating Principles for Impact Management, which you can read more about here, will build on this strategy.

Liquidnet, the global institutional investment network, announces that it has launched its EU operations in Dublin. Liquidnet EU Limited (located in Dublin’s International Financial Services Centre), has been authorised by the Central Bank of Ireland as a MiFID II investment firm and MTF operator. This new entity acts as an agency broker, ensuring Liquidnet continues to provide services to its Member community based in the European Economic Area (EEA).

Liquidnet began preparations to open an EEA-based presence in early 2017, following the UK invocation of Article 50 to leave the EU. As a result, and following an extensive evaluation and assessment of alternative locations, the firm chose to establish a presence in Dublin in readiness for Brexit. Dublin is a well-established international financial centre with an appropriate and supportive financial regulatory regime. As such, it is already home to a significant number of major financial institutions as well as a growing number of financial technology firms.

“It is vital that we continue to provide services to all our European clients, which include some of the world’s biggest institutional investors following Brexit,” said Simon Ormrod, Chief Operating Officer, Liquidnet EMEA. “Establishing our presence in Dublin ensures that our EU-based operations continue to give our clients global access to the same unique liquidity, innovation, and execution ecosystem that we currently offer from the UK.”

“In searching for a location for our EU operations, we carefully reviewed a number of jurisdictions in Europe before concluding that Dublin offered the regulatory environment and highly skilled workforce that will enable us to continue to serve our Members’ needs and grow our business in the region,” Ormrod continued.

Sopra Steria is to acquire fellow French core banking vendor SAB as part of a strategy to turn around its underperforming Banking Software division.

Global Payments Inc. (NYSE: GPN), a leading worldwide provider of payment technology and software solutions, and Discover Financial Services, a leading direct bank and payments services company, announced today that Global Payments is now an acquirer for all cards on the Discover Global Network in Hong Kong and Taiwan. This includes Discover, Diners Club International and affiliate partner cards.

Discover and Global Payments have been working together since 2006 with Discover Global Network card acceptance in place in the United Kingdom, United States and Canada. This relationship will now be extended at major hotels, luxury brands, food and beverage merchants and other businesses in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

“Hong Kong and Taiwan are the top destinations for tourists and business travelers, especially for our Discover Global Network issuing partners in Asia Pacific,” said Amy Parsons, senior vice president global acceptance at Discover. “We continue to look at ways to open up additional acceptance in these key markets to provide the best customer experience for our cardholders when they are traveling.”

“Global Payments is proud to extend our regional expertise in Diners Club and Discover card acceptance to additional markets across Asia Pacific,” said Konrad Chan, President Global Payments Asia Pacific. “Diners Club and Discover are exciting additions to our extensive product and service offerings. This new partnership reaffirms our continued commitment to leading payments technology across the globe by offering another form of payment acceptance and enhancing a seamless customer experience.”

The Discover Global Network includes Discover Network, Diners Club International, PULSE and affiliate networks. It has more than 44 million merchant acceptance locations and 2 million ATM cash access locations around the world.

PayU, an online payment service provider and Naspers’ fintech arm, today announced the acquisition of Wibmo, a Cupertino, CA-based industry leader in digital payment security and mobile payment technologies. This strategic acquisition combines PayU’s strong merchant network and Wibmo’s leadership in digital transaction security solutions to offer industry-leading payments solutions to merchants and financial institutions in India and other high growth markets.

Wibmo, an innovative digital payment company partners and deeply integrates with banks in over twenty countries to offer payment authentication and risk-based decisioning across billions of online and mobile payment transactions. The acquisition of Wibmo will enable PayU to build a robust digital payment ecosystem capable of harmonizing transaction processing on both issuing and acquiring side, to deliver a seamless payment experience and industry-leading success rates in online and mobile payments. Additionally, PayU and Wibmo together will be able to work with merchants and financial institutions to offer targeted payment solutions leveraging data from hundreds of millions of Indian consumers annually. This acquisition will also help PayU accelerate its credit business by leveraging big data to power credit on various online and offline merchants in partnership with leading lending players.

Wibmo has also built and operates a robust platform for banks to power mobile payments solutions. PayU and Wibmo will leverage this platform to partner with leading banks and be a catalyst in creating a full suite mobile commerce and payment ecosystem in multiple countries.

Aakash Moondhra, CFO, PayU Global said, “India is a priority market for PayU and we are committed to making digital payments frictionless through our innovative products and services, supporting the Government’s vision of a digital India. PayU’s technologically future-ready products are defining and reinventing India’s payments landscape, supporting the country’s transition to a cashless, digital economy. Through the acquisition of Wibmo, our endeavour is to positively impact and add value to the entire ecosystem including banks, consumers and merchants, with the combined service offerings of PayU and Wibmo. We will partner with leading banks to enable digital banking, merchants will gain with higher conversions rates and increased sales, and consumers will have a frictionless experience in completing digital payments transactions.”

Govind Setlur, founder and CEO, Wibmo added, “PayU has evolved within the complex payments landscape to become India’s biggest online payments processor, serving more than 350,000 merchants. We are excited to embark on this next chapter of Wibmo’s growth with PayU. By combining our track record and expertise in payment security and mobile payments with PayU’s strong merchant network and heritage in payments, the combined entity will be focussed on delivering more secure and seamless payments experience to its customers.” 

The deal brings together two highly complementary businesses and enables them to offer innovative financial services and new capabilities to the merchants and financial institutions, thereby helping them grow and scale. Given different capabilities and positioning in the value chain, Wibmo and PayU businesses will continue to run separately. However, both teams will work together to extract synergies and build unique business solutions from the two technology platforms. Govind Setlur, founder and CEO of Wibmo, a strong technology leader with 30 years of management experience in Silicon Valley and India, will become part of PayU’s leadership team, reporting into the PayU India CEO. 

Wibmo will continue to operate and serve all of its clients as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Naspers’ PayU under the leadership of Govind. Wibmo’s strong management team of seasoned technology and payments experts will also become part of the PayU team, adding value to the combined business. 

As well as helping Wibmo scale its business in India, PayU will draw upon its presence in other high growth markets to drive the expansion of Wibmo’s payment security and mobile payment business outside India. The investment takes PayU’s fintech investment total past the $500 million mark, putting the company within the top five leading global fintech investors over the last two years.

With entries received from all over the UK, a visit from Hugo Taylor and a competitive voting period which saw over 5,000 votes cast by the public, The Hand Dyed Shoe Co. was crowned the winner of Klarna’s ‘Smoooth Stores’ initiative at last night’s star-studded awards.

‘Smoooth Stores’ – launched by Klarna to discover and develop top retail talent across the UK – has named Simon Bourne and his experiential shoe making business from Durham the overall winner. He’ll receive £10,000 alongside mentoring from senior Klarna executives , and free use of Klarna’s Pay later service for 12 months.

The Hand Dyed Shoe Co, which creates handmade footwear from scrap leather in the furniture industry, has always done things a bit differently. Founder Simon claims his mission is to change the way the world buys shoes, offering a unique experience and service through all the touch points of the business. His approach has grown alongside the business, and started with free shoe-shining lessons, fresh coffee, and local gin for G&Ts.

With experiences offered in Durham, Dubai and London – the company has focused on putting customer experience, as well as workplace culture front and centre of its brand.

Special commendations have also been given to runners-up Britannical, the luxury children’s outerwear brand who came in second place, Charlotte Jade in third place, who offer hand drawn plant, floral and animal themed designs for wallpaper, upholstery and tiles. The pair have been awarded a £5,000 cash prize.

Simon Bourne, Founder of The Hand Dyed Shoe Co, said: “I come from quite humble beginnings – a council estate in Scunthorpe actually, and I never dreamed I’d be here in front of everyone to accept such a generous award. This opportunity will really drive  my business into the future - we’ll invest it wisely and I hope you’ll see much more from The Hand Dyed Shoe Co. in the future.”

Hugo Taylor, added: “From the moment I met Simon I knew he was incredibly passionate about his business, and rightly so, the quality of the products, and the unique experience he offers is something to be proud of. Working with him over the last few weeks has been a pleasure, and I know he’ll go on to do great things with the support of Klarna.”

Luke Griffiths, General Manager at Klarna UK, commented: “We are delighted to announce that Simon has won our Smoooth Stores competition. The unique experience which The Hand Dyed Shoe Co. creates is above and beyond what many retailers offer, and yet, it’s an intrinsic part of what makes Simon’s business so great. Every business we’ve had the chance to work with in this project has shown us that the UK’s retail scene is thriving and evolving. The Hand Dyed Shoe Co. will only continue to succeed, and I hope our prize and ongoing support will help accelerate that success for them - I can’t wait to follow his brand’s journey.”