UK fintech unicorn Thought Machine has cut 50 staff in roles it said were no longer needed, with sales and marketing positions mainly affected. The cloud-based core banking software provider, which now employs 590 staff, has grown rapidly and accumulated significant customers from the challenger and traditional bank sectors. Lloyds Banking Group, JPMorgan Chase, […]
Visa launches artificial intelligence advisory service
Visa is offering its customers artificial intelligence (AI) advisory services following the launch of an operation dedicated to the technology. As part of Visa Consulting and Analytics, the payments giant’s AI Advisory Practice will harness the skills and experience of 1000 experts across the world to provide customers with help to use AI to […]
Ransomware attack on major Chinese lender disrupts financial markets
A suspected LockBit ransomware attack on ICBC Financial Services, the US arm of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), a leading state-owned bank, disrupted activity in the US Treasury market on Thursday 9 November, allegedly forcing the bank to resort to using USB drives carried by messengers to settle trades. One of […]
Shawbrook Bank slashes mortgage processing time through low code
Shawbrook Bank has seen a fourfold reduction in the time it takes to process buy-to-let mortgage offers since rewriting legacy software using low code through a Pegasystems platform. The time it takes for customers to move from an indicative buy-to-let mortgage offer to a full digital offer has reduced from 40 days to 11 […]
Lloyds Bank warns over rising threat of crypto scams
Cryptocurrency scams have increased by 23% in 2023 compared with the same period last year, according to Lloyds Banking Group. In a report that collated accounts held at Lloyds Bank, Halifax and Bank of Scotland between January and September 2023, it found that victims were on average losing £10,741 to scammers, up from £7,010 […]
Million Brits could lose access to bank branch if closure rate continues
A million people in the UK could lose easy access to a bank branch in their local area, as banks continue to shutter their high street operations in favour of digital investments. Research by analytics software company SAS compared the number of branches in 2020 and 2023 in UK constituencies, areas represented by an […]
CIO interview: Sasha Jory, Hastings Direct
Sasha Jory developed her IT leadership skills in a series of roles with blue-chip finance firms. She joined insurer Hastings Direct in 2019 and became CIO in January 2023. As a member of the company’s executive team, she reports to the chief executive and is responsible for technology strategy, delivery and operations. “Hastings has […]
US government reinforces ICBC hack link to Citrix Bleed
The possibility that this was the case was first raised by security researcher and commentator Kevin Beaumont via social media website Mastodon on Thursday 9 November. Beaumont had posted evidence drawn from Shodan revealing that ICBC was running a Citrix NetScaler appliance that was not patched against CVE-2023-4966. According to the Wall Street Journal, which […]
JPMorgan Chase tops bank AI ranking
JPMorgan Chase has been named the leading global bank for artificial intelligence (AI) maturity in the benchmarking index from Evident AI. Created by AI platform Evident, the AI index is a benchmark for commercial AI adoption and performance in the financial service sector. First published in January 2023, it includes 50 of the biggest […]
Three-quarters of finance executives expect generative AI to replace them
Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is expected to take over the jobs of three-quarters of current financial services executives, according to a survey. Following a survey of around 500 executives at major banks and insurance companies, FintechOS’s Generative artificial intelligence: the technology polarising the financial services industry report revealed that 73% of executives believe GenAI will […]