Fintech, Finance, Technology, Banking Highlights – 30 November 2017
Tokyo-based bitcoin exchange bitFlyer launches in the US
BitFlyer, the Tokyo-based operator of the world’s largest bitcoin exchange, announced the official launch of its US-based virtual currency exchange platform.
The US expansion comes on the heels of bitFlyer’s explosive growth in Japan with more than $100 billion in virtual currency traded year-to-date. With more than 30 percent1 of worldwide Bitcoin exchange volume currently facilitated through bitFlyer, the US-based expansion has opened the doors for US traders to connect to the company’s Japanese exchange.
The company is bringing deep expertise and proprietary technology to the US market, targeting institutional investors, an audience currently untapped in the United States.
“Our expansion and upcoming cross-border trading addresses a huge unmet need in the US by institutional traders looking to access large amounts of liquidity across multiple virtual currency markets,” said bitFlyer USA’s Chief Operating Officer, Bartek Ringwelski. “Through our web interface or API, approved professional traders can be up and running and making trades in a matter of minutes.”
Apexx raises $4M in initial seed round
APEXX, the first single marketplace for global payments, today announces it has closed an initial seed funding round and been awarded a grant by Innovate UK, activity totalling $4M (£3.2M).
The round was led by Forward Partners, a top London-based VC which specialises in applied artificial intelligence (AI) and have previously invested in EmpowerRD, Ably and Epic. The round was also supported by MMC Ventures and Alliance Venture, based in Oslo, Norway.
The global APEXX network is made up of payment service providers and banks which helps merchants to reduce the cost of cross border payment acceptance, increase sales with optimised payment transaction routing and manage multiple provider relationships through a single integration point. Using the cloud-based platform, merchants can compare costs and get expert advice on the payment providers that will best suit them. It can save merchants upwards of 15% on the cost of processing credit or debit card payments and alternative payments.
The ai Corporation upgrades fraud detection platform
The ai Corporation (ai), an FCA approved expert in payment and risk management, today announced the addition of exploratory data analysis (EDA) and impact analysis functionality to its automated machine learning solution.
The enhanced learning functionality builds on ai’s award winning, self-service, fraud detection solution. Enabling more organisations to create an end to end, automated fraud strategy, and giving existing users the opportunity to test their entire fraud strategy, before production and deployment, in an industry first.
Dr. Mark Goldspink, CEO at The ai Corporation, says: “ai has raised the bar by combining EDA and Impact Analysis with our automated fraud detection solution. The combination is unique and provides our users with a self-service solution, which detects more fraud, reduces false positives and greatly improves back office efficiency for fraud strategy definition.
Sberbank conducts payment transaction using IBM blockchain tech
Sberbank has organised the Russian banking industry’s first-ever pilot blockchain payment transaction. The transaction used the IBM Blockchain Platform on the basis of HyperLedger Fabric. Sberbank’s partners and participants in the pilot were MegaFon, MegaLabs, Alfa-Bank, and IBM.
Sberbank CIB organised the process of transferring money from the payer to the receiver using blockchain technology. Sberbank’s IT infrastructure was used to set up a service for establishing the uniform transaction procedure, the certification centre of the network, and a web app for the client with a personal account section. In addition, Sberbank and Alfa-Bank hosted the nodes of the blockchain network. The technological process which was created will serve as the primary scenario for developing a new settlement function.
“The blockchain solution created by Sberbank has allowed us to make the first pilot payment transaction – using IBM Blockchain technology – in the history of the Russian banking industry,” commented Sberbank CIB Managing Director Stella Kudachkina. “Above all, the advantage of using this technology when performing settlements is the high speed at which transfers are made: after the money is sent the transaction is recorded on the receiver’s account almost instantly, in real time, unlike the traditional system that is used to make transfers.”
