Introduction: Risk Management and Financial Technology: Disruption, Obsolescence, Transformation

D. R. Maurice

“Financial technology”, or “fintech”, refers to the delivery of financial services through the use of both new and evolving technology. Broadly speaking, fintech’s goal is to reduce the cost of financial services by providing more cost-efficient and inclusive access. A growing consensus view holds that the emergence of new fintech ecosystems erodes the dominance of both global systemically important financial institutions (G-SIFIs) and national domestic-level banks. The supply of funding and demand for financial-services resources are shifting in response. As sovereign wealth funds and prominent institutional investors, such as Berkshire Hathaway, increase equity holdings in FANG shares – Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon and Alibaba – investment in the traditional banking sector may decline. Partially reflecting a shift in demand, fintech enterprises not only promote both their own banking services and payment systems via blockchain technology, but also endorse systems simultaneously to support new “digital”, “cashless” or “cryptocurrencies”.

Definitions aside, the changing financial-services business model poses dynamic and new forms of potentially more volatile