Only 14% of those interrogated predicted that banks can suffer from financial technology disruption.
Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase will considerably benefit from the coming wave of financial technology disruption according to the survey conducted by the Autonomous Research. Meanwhile the survey also shows that U.S. banks will suffer only limited disruption from financial industry startups.
One of the Europe’s leading independent research providers on banking and insurance companies polled 150 executives and investors and about 85% of them predicted selected disruption or a mix of winners and losers.
Only 14% thought banks face a significant threat. JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs are those very banks that get the most considerable revenue from investment banking and trading worldwide. Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. follow because mobile payments become more habitual while the blockchain reduces costs in many institutional businesses.
“Technology doesn’t move as fast as people think,” Brian Foran, a partner at Autonomous Research, told Bloomberg. “The pace of change will be slow enough that the traditional players can co-opt, whether it’s through building, buying or partnering, and acquire the technology disruption.”
Autonomous Research is known for its impartiality. Its mission sounds like: “Autonomous Research aims to be the leading independent research provider on financial companies globally. We are a true partnership with no outside investors. We are unconflicted – we do not advise corporates, nor do we engage in proprietary trading activities or asset management. We are fully focused on servicing our clients with high quality research and execution capabilities across the capital structure.”
Banks need to update their services in order to keep up with the progress. To avoid losing customers, they have to provide more technology-driven services, including peer-to-peer payments and same-day approval of business loans.
Goldman Sachs has focused on the blockchain recently. The multinational investment bank has developed its own cryptocurrency for a settlement system for trading stocks, bonds and other assets. The new cryptocurrency is called SETLCoin and it guarantees “nearly instantaneous execution and settlement” for trades.
The currency aims at facilitation and acceleration of securities trade. “While the Bitcoin hype cycle has gone quiet, Silicon Valley and Wall Street are betting that the underlying technology behind it, the Blockchain, can change… well everything,” admits Goldman Sachs.
One more research company Aite Group once conducted an interesting survey. According to it banks will spend about $400 million on the technology behind bitcoin by 2019. For the whole year of 2015 financial firms invested $75 million into the blockchain, what is twice the sum they invested in 2014.
Ben Knieff, senior analyst on the Retail Banking & Payments team, explained: “Bitcoin has been the most visible application of the blockchain, but it and other cryptocurrencies are a tiny fraction of the technology’s potential applications. Many technical details and variations signify different implementations, all of which could mean potentially disruptive applications for these technologies.”
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