NatWest is saving on costs and improving the customer journey through technology.  “Since 2021, we have delivered run rate savings of around 250 million pounds ($315 million) a year through digitizing customer journeys,” newly appointed Chief Executive Paul Thwaite said during the bank’s fourth-quarter earnings call today. “We continue to simplify journeys across the bank…

Bank of America is working to control the fallout following an October data breach at third-party vendor Infosys McCamish Solutions.  The bank is offering the more than 57,000 affected clients a free, two-year membership to IdentityWorks, an identity protection product from Experian, according to an Infosys McCamish Solutions filing with the state of Maine. “If…

I’ve just finished a very long and fascinating read by Cory Doctorow in The Financial Times, talking about how the Big Tech giants have turned our world to shit. He calls it the enshittification process. The process runs in four stages: they claim platforms are good to their users: don’t be evil; making the world……

Things we’re reading today include … Monzo reaches nine million customer milestone (finextra.com) Commonwealth Bank chief executive Matt Comyn makes shock cash confession | Daily Mail Standard Chartered needs drastic action, not diplomatic polish (ft.com) How investors can hold greenwashing banks to account — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism Zain Launches Innovative Fintech App Offering……

Financial institutions are identifying uses for AI throughout their operations, creating increased demand for data scientists in the financial services industry.   “We’re seeing a rapid push into the hiring of data scientists,” Kevin Green, chief product and marketing officer at software development company Truent, told Bank Automation News.   A data scientist combines math, statistics, programming,…

HSBC is teaming with Google Cloud to provide financing to climate-mitigating companies on the cloud provider’s network.  Google Cloud will connect the companies with HSBC’s climate tech finance team to explore venture debt financing options, according to a Feb. 8 release.  The Google Cloud Ready – Sustainability program tracks companies that help their customers achieve…

I got an interesting research report from Economist Impact the other day, commissioned by Temenos. Usually I ignore such emails and updates, but this one was interesting as it’s focused upon how traditional financial providers are competing with challengers like Monzo, Starling, Bunq and Chime. According to the study, “Challenging the challengers: Europe’s banks face……

Things we’re reading today include … JPMorgan sued by chief executive of fintech it co-owns (ft.com) At least six Australian banks hit by network outages including Ubank and Bank Australia | Banking | The Guardian European banks are challenging the challengers (finextra.com) Stolen Face ID scans used to break into bank accounts • The Register……

Financial institutions prioritize investment in cybersecurity technology but no matter how much they spend for protection, their systems and data remain vulnerable.   “You could never say any organization is 100% secure and they’ll never be hacked,” Ray Kelly, fellow at cybersecurity company Synopsys Software Integrity Group, told Bank Automation News, noting that even the U.S.…

NCR Atleos reported that its self-service banking business continued to grow in the fourth quarter.   NCR added more than 2,000 ATMs in the quarter, making the total number of active units 20,000, Chief Executive Tim Oliver said during NCR’s Q4 earnings call on Feb. 14. NCR supplied hardware, software and operational services, according to NCR’s…