Fintech Focus For September 3, 2021

Quote To Start The Day: “Part of the reason we had the Great Depression is people were aware of crowd psychology. Every day, they were watching the stock price index as a barometer of the health of the economy, and that made it more volatile.”

Source: Robert Shiller

One Big Thing In Fintech: Gary Gensler, the chairman of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, has appeared virtually before the European Parliament to share his policy recommendations regarding the regulation of crypto assets.

Speaking to the Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs on Wednesday, Gensler highlighted the role financial technologies are playing in globalizing economic flows and undermining siloed national markets:

“I think the transformation we’re living through right now could be every bit as big as the internet in the 1990s.”

Source: Cointelegraph

Other Key Fintech Developments:

• Coinbase to integrate Polygon tech.
• eToro onboarding Lule Demmissie.
• US Bank took stakes in fintech VCs.
• Coinbase to offer staking rewards.
• Jeeves raises $57M funding round.
• Point Card secures $46.5 Series B.
• QED’s Rotman on rebuilding banks.
• Binance placed on investor alert list.
• Point adds $46.5M Series B round.
• Fintech tackling financial inclusion.
• SEC taps AnChain.AI for monitoring.
• CME, IHS launch a post-trade firm.
• ByteDance will downsize its fintech.
• Stripe behind Twitter’s Super Follow.
• OKEx intros new NFT marketplace.
• BridgeTower forms new $20M fund.
• Robinhood plans early deposit offer.
• Metromile welcomes new leadership.
• Manchester City will drop new NFT.
• IHS Markit, FinTech Studios integrate.
• Homelight secures $363M funding.
• El Salvador approves a bitcoin fund.
• Audius adds Solana’s NFT support.

Watch Out For This: Xi Jinping, China’s leader, has collided with economic reality. His crackdown on private enterprise has been a significant drag on the economy. The most vulnerable sector is real estate, particularly housing. China has enjoyed an extended property boom over the past two decades, but that is now coming to an end. Evergrande, the largest real estate company, is over-indebted and in danger of default. This could cause a crash.

Source: Financial Times

Interesting Reads:

• Police took ex-Marine’s life savings.
• Three doses to become a standard.
• Roe v. Wade left in peril amid curbs.
• Jim Simmons, RenTech paying up.
• Implications of unemployment cuts.
• ARK Invest adds passive ESG fund.
• Climate change bankrupting towns.
• Why the NY subways keep flooding.

Market Moving Headline: Investors will be watching Friday’s jobs report for the latest read on the health of the labor market as Federal Reserve officials debate winding down monetary support later this year.

The U.S. probably added 725,000 jobs in August, a more moderate pace compared to each of the prior two months but stronger than gains seen early this year, according to the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg.

A strong report would signal that businesses are having more success hiring after months of limited labor supply. But risks related to the delta variant could mean a softer-than-expected payrolls print and complicate the Fed’s timeline for tapering asset purchases.

Source: Bloomberg