Separating apples from oranges: identifying threats to financial stability originating from FinTech

Abstract

Over the past few years, ... From Google Wallet to Bitcoin, all these technology-enabled financial innovations have been a ‘wake-up call’ to address the regulatory aspects of a new ‘era’ of financial services and market players. The FinTech sector comprises a very heterogeneous group of providers of technology-driven financial innovations. Some of them open up new markets in the financial industry; others offer new solutions to replace or augment products or services already offered by banks, asset managers or insurance companies. More changes are underway with the rapid growth of agile innovative players boasting new business models, user-friendly consumer interfaces, peer-to-peer services or advanced automated tools.