7 FinTech trends 2018 

           2018 is a remarkable year for Financial Technology development. New start-ups are sprouting rapidly, offering innovative solutions that have growing influences on our daily lives. Today, Bangkok Bank InnoHub brings you 7 FinTech trends that showcase how business and financial innovations can improve our lives.

           5 -10 years ago, it was difficult for inexperienced investors to make the right decisions in the stock market. Since not everyone has access or is willing to invest in a stockbroker or financial advisor, a financial technology called Robo Advisor was developed to help simplify investment decisions for novice investors. As a tool, Robo Advisor is an easily accessible and affordable investment planning solution, based on data in investor portfolios such as annual income, investment goals, and risk tolerance. The system will then monitor, analyze, and provide investment recommendations. Although Robo Advisors cannot yet replace the intricate consultation investors might get from a human financial advisor, it has the potential to harness other technologies such as AI learning that will eventually enhance its capacity and flexibility to rival that of human advisors.

           For every click on a website, every video clip played, every online purchase, every social network engagement – our online interactions are stored in a database called Big Data. Big Data Analytics is a process of examining the large and diverse data sets for patterns or correlations that marketers and analysts can utilize to improve business strategies and better serve their customers. Content streaming applications such as Spotify and Netflix are providing music and movies to match users’ preference based on their viewing histories. And an African tech start-up, InVenture offers loans to those without a credit score in the conventional banking system by utilizing Big Data Analytics to provide credit scoring based on users’ daily finance data collected via SMS and mobile app interactions. This technology benefits all parties by allowing businesses to provide personalized services that will meet individual demands and maximize customers satisfaction.           Many people think of Blockchain as the technology that underpins and enhances the security of cryptocurrency. However, Blockchain is actually a form of decentralized databases which allows everyone in the system equal access and scrutinization. For this reason, there are many attempts to utilize Blockchain technology for various benefits. One example is validating ownership of valuable digital art. Previously, digital art could be freely duplicated and shared, so it was virtually impossible to verify the original creator and owner. With Blockchain, digital copyright and ownership can be recorded and publicly verified which is beneficial to both creators and buyers to retain the unique values of the otherwise uncertifiable digital asset.           51% of the e-commerce transactions in Thailand occur on social media platforms. This so-called Social Commerce has become popular because it provides a better online shopping experience where buyers and sellers can interact directly. The more prominent Social Commerce becomes, the more technologies will be developed to facilitate, expedite and secure these transactions, for example; technologies for payment via messenger applications, or features that provide better and easier product browsing such as Facebook Shop and Instagram Product Tag.           Chatbots were originally developed as a logical responder to human queries to provide answers, information, and suggestions. Conventional Chatbots operate on an extensive rule-based system pre-programmed by humans to accommodate logical conversation. However, new-generation Chatbots are AI with developed Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Natural Language Understanding (NLU) technologies for better learning, understanding, and interpretation of complex sentences and linguistic nuances. These allow Chatbots to have more meaningful and accurate conversations with the users. An example of a well-known Chatbot is Google Assistant, which is so advanced it can carry on a conversation like an actual person.           Traditionally, data processing algorithms are based solely on rules and commands designed by programmers. However, due to the massive influx of data nowadays, Machine Learning technology has been developed so that programs can devise their own algorithms to analyze and learn from the abundance of available data and user histories, thus solving the problems of unusual outliers or blind spots in the pre-programmed systems. In business, this technology has been applied in various ways. For example, in streaming platforms, it is mainly used to evaluate and determine the type of contents which can best meet the demands of each unique individual. In data security, Kaspersky Lab has reported that among 325,000 malware detected daily, most have only 2-10% variations from previous iterations, therefore, Machine Learning’s ability to detect anomalies can improve the accuracy of predicting and reporting security breaches.           In this digital day and age, our lives are inextricably intertwined with the online world; from social commerce purchasing to financial transactions via mobile applications. Therefore, the development of cybersecurity systems is crucial to protect ourselves from cyber-crimes. Many biometric technologies such as facial recognition, iris scan, and fingerprint scan have been integrated to increase the level of security of digital transactions and interactions. For instance, a recent Swedish start-up, Covr Security has developed a digital authentication platform via a mobile application that allows users to bypass the use of a password entirely.           All over the world financial innovation is advancing rapidly. We humans, as both its developers and users, are equally affected and cannot afford to fall behind our own inventions. Bangkok Bank InnoHub is now ready to bring you the latest development and interesting news about FinTech so we can prepare Thailand’s economy for the future changes in innovation and technology.