Bank technology

Though banks are bigger in peer-to-peer payments overall, Venmo is better at functionality and branding and millennials love it. Now banks are launching Zelle with high hopes and the advantage of real-time speed. Can they catch up? Should they even bother?

Artificial intelligence is moving from science fiction to practical reality fast, and it's in banks' best interest to gear up now for the changes ahead. Here are some strategies to consider.

Regulators here made strides to encourage innovation in 2016, while Brexit cast doubt on the London fintech boom. Yet the cross-Atlantic payments battle is just beginning.

American Banker readers share their views on the most pressing banking topics of the week. Comments are excerpted from reader response sections of AmericanBanker.com articles and our social media platforms.

For years, there's been a lot of talk about personal information as an unalloyed asset. But by now it should be clear that the more information a company has about its customers, the bigger a target it is for hackers.

One of the designers who worked on Kasisto's chatbot Kai argues that technologists are perpetuating female stereotypes; SoFi has some unusual ideas about how to get to know its customers better; and Fidelity gives in to the ETF trend. Also, Cathy Engelbert, Barbara Boxer and Megyn Kelly.

The jobs of chief investment officer departments and financial advisers are likely to change as banks and stand-alone wealth managers adopt artificial intelligence to inform the advice they give clients.

2016 was very good to these financial services executives, who succeeded where others failed, sold their businesses for large sums, felt the love of regulators or could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

Banks are grappling with new challenges in trying to work with voice assistants like Alexa in Amazon's Echo to allow customers to check balances and perform other tasks. But with voice banking on the horizon, banks cannot afford to stall their efforts.

Wells Fargo's innovation group has appointed Peggy Mangot for the newly created position of senior vice president of its design and delivery leadership team.