Opinions

The Fed appears to have looked at Bitcoin as a means for real-time payments in the banking system but shelved the concept for now.

The next year will be huge for fraud and security in retail. Most concern around risk management for the year ahead is focussed on system security and fraud management, which is crucial to today's transactions.

While the payments industry is far ahead of other industries such as health care in adopting encryption, choosing the right method is still a challenge.

This year, electronic trading will finally come to the bond market and more banks will adopt technologies that harness social media to flag potentially fraudulent customers.

There are less than 300 days left until the liability shift for US credit and debit card payments occurs, but it appears that consumers and their credit and debit card issuers are not exactly on the same page when it comes to the sense of urgency around making EMV-enabled payment technology a reality.

Let this be the year that the financial industry stops using the phrase "big data" and remembers that the goal of technology is to make people's lives simpler.

Many community banks will soon have to replace outdated technology — expenses that will hit them in an ongoing environment of compressed net interest margins, increasing compliance costs and higher capital requirements.

A recap of the informed opinions (and the discussions they generated) on BankThink this week.

With the introduction of Apple Pay, mobile wallet payment systems promise to disrupt long stagnant payment card status quo. But will these new services make our data and transactions safer?

While computers may have bested humans in chess and mutual fund management, loan underwriting is one area where men can still beat machines.