Solanteq at the IV International Banking Forum

A two-day event was held on the topic: ‘The Cashless Economy: Towards Sustainable Banking’ in Baku, Azerbaijan on 6-7 November. Solanteq was the main sponsor of the event. Non-cash payments are in great demand on the financial market all over the world. As a result, it is vital to build and evolve the digital payment ecosystem to ensure banks and financial institutions remain competitive. THE CASHLESS ECONOMY: INITIATIVES AND CHALLENGES Mikhail Alekseev, Head of Digital Transformation...

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The world moves away from plastic

We all know that nowadays you don’t need to carry cash in the wallet to make a purchase. And thanks to mobile technologies people can now even leave their bank card at home. But what is really amazing is that now consumers don’t need to have a payment card at all, which brings never-before-possible convenience to clients. Digital banking is on the up and people can manage their finances on the go, experiencing truly personalised retail banking services. A BETTER WAY TO HANDLE MONEY The digital ...

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Staying on the cutting edge in 2019: top features for mobile banking

Today it is hard to find a global bank that does not offer mobile banking services. And apps are no longer just a convenient way to check your balance, they are an integral part of the banking experience and highly valued by consumers. Despite people complaining that smartphones are killing face-to-face interaction and hate it when others are phubbing, for the time being smartphones constitute the best way to access the digital world and multiple bank services. MOBILE BANKING IS NOT JUST A FAS...

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China’s big plan

The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) is preparing to become the first major central bank to issue a digital version of its currency — the yuan, seeking to be abreast with and in control of an evolving economy. Unlike cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, payments with the digital yuan will not be totally anonymous, and its value will be as stable as the physical yuan. WHY IS THE CENTRAL BANK DOING IT? There are important regulatory and political considerations why implementing a digital currency in Ch...

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Libra as an alternative future currency

The new cryptocurrency Libra was introduced by Facebook three months ago, on 18 June 2019. It is expected that the launch of the Libra at the global level will take place in the first quarter of 2020, and testing will begin at the end of 2019. Libra will be integrated into Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp, users will be able to utilize it to make purchases on Instagram and, possibly, in other services that will become partners of the Libra ecosystem. KEY POINTS The most important thing with the ...

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The unified instant payments gateway

With the rapid pace of digitalisation and the constant growth of e-commerce, easy and instant cashless payments are becoming a must-have for consumers of financial services. The past few years have seen the fast development of national fast payment systems in compliance with the ISO 20022 international financial communications standard. Currently countries are one by one implementing local, instant real-time payment systems, including: Europe – SCT Inst, Australia – NPP, India – UPI, Sweden – S...

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Point of Sale is a work horse for retail

In the 1970s, when ABBA recorded their first album and when the second Walt Disney World began accepting visitors, another great achievement happened - the birth of the bulky magnetic stripe reader now known as a point of sale (POS) terminal. Today,ABBA’s audio cassettes are no longer for sale and plenty more  amusement parks have opened, but the POS terminal continue to be in first position in popularity for making payments. Since then, it has gone through many technological advances and ...

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Solanteq Days

On the best weekend of July, Captain Morgan Hotel was the venue for a conference and the center of a clash of oars with kayaking races sponsored by OnegoSurf and Work & Sport. In the evening, it turned into a lounge area with relaxing music, exquisite food from Frank and a wonderful view of the setting sun. The fifth anniversary of Solanteq offered a change of activity, and as you all know this makes for the perfect break! The first ever SOLANTEQ SUP Surfi...

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A new landscape of cross-border Payments

On 17 July 2019 in Brussels, SWIFT – a member-owned cooperative that brings together more than 11,000 banking organizations, securities institutions and corporate clients, announced enhanced global payment innovation (gpi) for corporates. WHAT IS GPI? Originally rolled out in 2017, the SWIFT gpi service aims to improve cross-border payments. The objective is to provide money transfers within 24 hours with constant end-to-end tracking and transparency throughout the entire payment chain. Previous...

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To be forewarned is to be forearmed or how to guard against fraud?

Customers want banking to be fast, simple and affordable, providing seamless secure digital experiences across multiple channels. On the other hand, fraudsters are devising increasingly sophisticated tools and techniques, benefiting from the large quantity of breached identity data flooding the web. As the banking sector evolves, so does fraud. To stay one step ahead of fraudsters while providing a high-quality customer experience with the ever increasing pace of digitalisation, banks and finan...

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