Who In The *F* Knows

No really, embedded finance was one of the buzz words of 2022 but in many cases (maybe outside of the US given some of the new laws/regulation) this will be the year we will start seeing embedded finance being implemented across geographies in key ways with big pay offs.

Scarlett Sieber, Chief Strategy & Growth Officer

Many banks and BaaS companies are going to go under and the banks are going to have consent orders all over the place. Some charters might get revoked.

That said, I hear Scottie Pippen is bullish on NFTs so I’ll be watching that closely as well.

Zach Anderson Pettet, Content Director, USA

The freemium model we’ve become so accustomed with from fintechs (be it digital banks or BNPLs) is going to come to an end.

The age of free money (zero interest rates) is over, that’s not just going to make it more expensive for VCs to fund fintechs, it’ll also reduce the amount of capital available for funding (as high interest rates make earning low-risk but sizable returns more likely).

Micky Tesfaye, Content Lead, Europe

Unicorns will become history as we’ll see the creation of centaurs… a combination of man and beast… or of Fintech and ? The expected ones are banks, but we could see retailers, telecoms and tech companies get into the action as well. The driver behind this trend will be the funding environment coupled with greater ability of acquirers to see or anticipate value creation.

Sanjib Kalita, Wizard

Look- that’s the plan. And he has the friends that can help him do it.

Rachel Morrissey, Head of Content, USA & Executive Producer, MoneyPot

The idea that everything should be either centralised or decentralised was never going to last. Now that DeFi has stuck around for a while, many of those working within it have begrudgingly seen the merit of traditional systems. Likewise, older institutions have grasped that they can’t bury their heads in the sand. 2023 is the year to start asking, ‘what should, and what shouldn’t, we decentralise?’

But yes, expect skirmishes. The eldest DeFi sibling, Bitcoin, is still a teenager after all.

Ian Horne, Head Of Content, Europe