Study Id45600 Statista Report Fintech
Study Id45600 Statista Report Fintech
Study Id45600 Statista Report Fintech
The last decade has seen a considerable disruption of the traditional banking industry, especially in
the areas of payments, lending, wealth management, and retail banking. Interestingly, this change
has not been limited to Financial Technology (FinTech) start-ups. Large technology and eCommerce
companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple and Alibaba have managed to leverage their
massive reach and technological capabilities to pose a stiff challenge to competitors. The FinTech
industry in our definition consists of four segments: Digital Payments, Alternative Financing,
Alternative Lending, and Personal Finance. Of those four, Digital Payments has by far the largest
transaction volume.
The digital payment and lending businesses, including mobile wallets, P2P1 payments, alternative
lending, cryptocurrencies and robo-advisors, are now finding mainstream acceptance in both
developed and emerging countries. Broadly speaking, there are three types of players in the digital
commerce payments market: providers with their own wallet such as Venmo and PayPal, online
payment interface providers such as Stripe and B2B2, and offline payment providers such as Square.
These providers make money by charging fees for each transaction, which is usually paid by the
merchant. Alternative lenders and robo-advisors make their money by either charging service fees
from borrowers and investors or transaction fees from the bank.
Currently, the Statista Digital Market Outlook focuses on international P2P money transfers. This
deep-dive chapter looks at both domestic and international digital transfers, including those for
micro-services and bill sharing for the U.S., the UK, India, and China. The U.S. P2P payments market is
among the biggest globally. The market is expected to increase from US$151bn in 2017 to
US$381bn in 2022. The most dominant players are Zelle, Venmo, and Square. The Indian P2P
payments market is among the most exciting and fastest-growing globally, poised to increase at an
overall average annual growth rate of over 72% from US$10.5bn in 2017 to US$159.2bn in 2022.
Blockchain is a distributed ledger technology that can be used to execute, store, and verify
transactions of every kind. Its main uses are in money transfer, buying and selling stocks, insurance
contracts, and buying and selling physical goods or energy. Blockchain funding is still increasing, with
over 144 start-ups having managed to raise US$640 million in funding in 2017. Cryptocurrencies are
probably the best-known adoption of blockchain technology. Bitcoin, first emerging in 2009, is by far
the oldest and the most widely used cryptocurrency in the world. It also has the highest market
capitalization and highest value per unit at the moment.
Ant Financial, the most highly valued FinTech company in the world, is the holding company of
Alibaba’s financial products. It operates in various business areas, including digital payments (Alipay),
business finance (Ant Micro Loan), marketplace lending (Ant Check Later), wealth management (Ant
Fortune), online banking (Mybank), and insurance and credit reference (Sesame Credit). Its
dominance can be gauged from the fact that in February 2014, Alipay announced for the first time
that its mobile payments volume was greater than that of PayPal and Square combined. Key factors
behind Ant Financial’s success include diversified businesses, robust government support, and a
strong international presence.
2
1: Peer-to-peer 2: Business-to-business
Management summary (2/2)
When paying online, designated online payment methods (e.g. PayPal, Amazon Payments) are
highest in use in Germany, the UK and China as compared to other forms of payments such as
credit/debit cards, prepaid cards, and direct debit. PayPal dominates the German, UK and U.S.
markets, whereas Unionpay and Alipay have the highest usage in China. Credit cards were mostly
used by U.S. Americans for making online payments. Cash still dominates financial transactions at the
POS in the U.S. and Germany, but in China mobile payments have already taken the lead. The most
widely used mobile payment provider in China is WeChat Pay, whereas Apple Pay leads in the UK and
the U.S., and Payback Pay tops the chart in Germany.
The U.S. leads in the number of FinTech companies globally. Specifically, most of the prominent U.S.
FinTech companies are located in California and New York. We will have a closer look at some of
those prominent U.S. FinTech start-ups: Venmo, Stripe, Ondeck, LendingClub, Prosper, SoFi,
Betterment, and Wealthfront. Even if they offer services in the same segments, their specific
conditions and features vary a lot. In the marketplace lending area, for example, SoFi offers personal
loans with variable interest rates, whereas LendingClub and Prosper provide them with fixed rates.
SoFi, based in California, is the most well-funded FinTech company with over US$2bn raised since
2011. The company is backed by key investors such as SoftBank, Silver Lake Partners, Peter Thiel and
others and was last valued at US$4.5bn in Q1 2017. Avant and Kabbage are two other key FinTech
start-ups that managed to get more than US$1.5bn in funding.
A number of U.S. banks have made FinTech investments. Goldman Sachs leads with 20, followed by
CapitalOne (13) and Citigroup (12). Additionally, the banks have started innovation hubs focused on
various areas such as mobile banking, blockchain and cryptocurrencies, wearables, the internet of
things, next-generation commerce, authentication, biometrics integration, augmented reality, and big
data.
3
Table of contents (1/3)
Management summary 2
Table of contents 4
Introduction 7
▪ Digital Payments 9
▪ Alternative Financing 13
▪ Alternative Lending 17
▪ Personal Finance 21
▪ Key players 25
▪ Venture capital investments 27
▪ FinTech vs. traditional banks 29
4
Table of contents (2/3)
Consumer insights 70
▪ Online payment 71
▪ Mobile payments at POS 74
▪ P2P payments 81
Competitive landscape 84
▪ Overview of selected U.S. FinTech companies 85
▪ Comparison: Alternative Lending – Crowdlending 86
▪ Comparison: Alternative Lending – Marketplace Lending 87
▪ Comparison: Personal Finance – Robo-Advisors 88
▪ Venmo 89
▪ Stripe 93
▪ OnDeck 96
▪ LendingClub 99
▪ Prosper 106
▪ SoFi 110
▪ Wealthfront 116
5
Table of contents (3/3)
Appendix 136
▪ Glossary 137
▪ Statista Global Consumer Survey 139
▪ Statista Digital Market Outlook 140
▪ Statista Research & Analysis, Statista Content & Design 141
▪ Authors, imprint, and disclaimer 142
6
Introduction
The last decade has seen a considerable disruption of the traditional banking
industry, especially in the areas of payments, lending, wealth management,
and retail banking. Interestingly, this change has not been limited to financial
technology (FinTech) start-ups.
Large technology and eCommerce companies such as Google, Amazon,
Facebook, Apple and Alibaba have managed to leverage their massive reach
and technological capabilities to pose a stiff challenge to competitors.
The FinTech industry as we consider it consists of four segments: Digital
Payments, Alternative Financing, Alternative Lending, and Personal Finance.
Of those four, Digital Payments has by the largest transaction volume.
7
FinTech disruptors challenge
traditional banks
Overview
Banking has traditionally been one of the sectors that were most resistant to technological
disruption. Over the years, the industry had built a robust business model aided by favorable
regulations and a general consumer inertia against switching providers. However, the financial crisis
of 2008 triggered a sudden upsurge in FinTech start-ups across the world. Public anger at the
established banking system, stringent regulations imposed on lending in the post-crisis period and
complacency by banks created a conducive environment for FinTech growth.
The term FinTech essentially refers to the disruption caused by the use of technology in the financial
services industry. Technology-focused start-ups are now beginning to offer the products and services
that were only provided by banks in the past. The last decade has witnessed the rise of various start-
ups that have laid down a strong challenge to the major global banks in various areas, including
payments, lending, wealth management, and retail banking. Moreover, large technology and
eCommerce companies such as Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple and Alibaba (GAFAA) are also
leveraging their massive reach, technological capabilities, and the ability to deliver an exceptional
customer experience to break into the FinTech industry. We consider four major segments within the
FinTech market:
▪ Digital Payments
▪ Alternative Financing
▪ Alternative Lending
▪ Personal Finance
Evolution of FinTech
8
1: Peer-to-peer
Digital Payments transaction value
will reach US$6,336bn by 2023
Digital Payments: overview (1/2)
Digital Payments include payments for consumer products and services which are made over the
internet and mobile payments at point-of-sale (POS) via smartphone applications.
Within the Digital Payments segment, two types of transactions can be differentiated:
▪ Digital Commerce: Consumer transactions made via the internet which are directly related to
online shopping for products and services. Online transactions can be made via various payment
methods (credit cards, direct debit, invoice, or online payment providers such as PayPal and
AliPay).
▪ Mobile POS Payments: Includes transactions at point-of-sale (POS) that are processed via
smartphone applications (so-called “mobile wallets”). Well-known providers of mobile wallets are
ApplePay and Samsung Pay. The payment in this case is made by a contactless interaction of the
smartphone app with a suitable payment terminal belonging to the merchant.
The following are not included in this segment: transactions between businesses (business-to-
business payments), bank transfers initiated online (that are not in connection with products and
services purchased online), and payment transactions at point-of-sale where mobile card readers
(terminals) are used.
6,336
5,729
+13.9%2
5,128 2,108
4,534 1,693
1,327
3,953
1,011
3,403 745
2,906 528
358
4,036 4,228
3,523 3,801
2,876 3,208
2,548
9
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook 2: CAGR: Compound Annual
Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
China leads the Digital Payments
market
Digital Payments: overview (2/2)
The Digital Payments market is growing at an average annual growth rate of almost 14% from 2017
to 2023. Digital Commerce is the biggest segment with 88% (US$2,548.5bn) of the total transaction
value in 2017 and 67% (US$4,228bn) by 2023. Especially Mobile POS Payments are growing fast from
US$357.7bn (12%) in 2017 to US$2,107.8bn (33%) by 2023.
China is set to remain the biggest market for Digital Payments between 2017 with 34% (US$997.9bn)
and 2023 with 49% (US$3081.3bn) of the global1 market share. Together, China and the U.S. will
account for nearly 70% of the global1 transaction value by 2023. The third biggest market in 2023 –
the UK – is far behind China and the U.S. with a transaction value of US$219.4bn. Japan and Germany
follow with US$189.7bn and US$151.8bn, respectively.
In the field of Digital Commerce, growth is mainly based on a growing user base: an increase from
2,734 million users in 2017 to 3,263 by 2023 is expected. The global1 average transaction value for
Digital Commerce will only grow from US$932 in 2017 to US$1,296 by 2023, whereas the average
transaction value per user for Mobile POS Payments will grow massively from US$448 in 2017 to
US$1,316 by 2023. Thus, the gap in average transaction values is shrinking, which also drives most of
the growth in those two segments.
2,689
2,304
1,934
1,586
1,270 1,343
1,253
1,164
998 1,072
979 936
885 823 881
791 762
634 698
573
10
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
China leads in Digital Payments
transaction value
Digital Payments: key performance indicators (1/2)
UK 137
8.2%
219
Japan 143
4.8%
190
Germany 104
6.6%
152
South Korea 93
7.4%
142
India 41
20.9%
127
France 79
8.3%
127
Canada 64
97 7.2%
Brazil 37
13.4%
79
Russia 34
65 11.3%
Australia 32
57 10.1%
Italy 32
54 9.4%
Spain 33
54 8.6%
Mexico 24
49 12.4%
Indonesia 19
40 13.6%
Netherlands 23
39 8.9%
Sweden 20
32 8.5%
Argentina 14
27 11.3%
Turkey 14
27 11.0%
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year 11
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Average transaction value in Mobile
POS Payments is growing fast
Digital Payments: key performance indicators (2/2)
1,602
1,500
1,381
1,246
1,098
946
799
811
678
558
448
12
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
The Alternative Financing segment
is growing at a CAGR1 of 19%
Alternative Financing: overview (1/2)
The Alternative Financing market segment refers to digital financial services for business customers.
In view of processing complexity, this market is normally focused on small and medium-sized
enterprises (SMEs2) and freelancers.
Within the Alternative Financing segment, two types of transactions can be differentiated:
▪ Crowdfunding: Solutions that are used for non-monetary compensation, e.g. product launches,
music, art & film financing ("reward-based").
Bank financing is not considered, neither are any financial aspects that reach beyond the scope of
small and medium-sized enterprises or donation-based crowdfunding models.
The Alternative Financing market is growing at an average annual growth rate of over 19% from 2017
to 2023. Crowdfunding is the biggest segment, with 57% (US$3.9bn) of the segment’s transaction
value in 2017 and 60% (US$11.9bn) by 2023.
Crowdinvesting Crowdfunding
19.7
18.2
+19.1%1 16.4
14.1
11.9
11.5 11.0
9.8
9.0 8.4
6.9 6.8
5.2
3.9
7.3 7.8
5.7 6.5
3.7 4.7
3.0
13
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year 2: Small and medium-
sized enterprises 3: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
China is by far the biggest market
for Alternative Financing
Alternative Financing: overview (2/2)
The term Crowdinvesting (also: equity crowdfunding) defines a variety of transactions where an
unspecified number of investors come together in order to invest in a well-defined purpose. The
following segment exclusively considers “equity-based crowdfunding”; investments in equity shares
or profit-related returns (for example, royalties or convertible loans). Crowdfunding has become a
popular financing option for start-ups and is considered a part of venture capital financing. Well-
known platforms in this area are EquityNet, CrowdCube, and Seedrs.
Crowdfunding is the larger segment in Alternative Financing and will remain so through to 2023 with
a market share of 60%.
While usually the U.S. or Europe are pioneer markets in technological developments, China is by far
the biggest Alternative Finance market. This is due to the immense volume of small and medium-
sized businesses as well as a less developed banking infrastructure.
8.0
6.4
4.8
14
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
The U.S. market will not even reach
20% of China’s size by 2023
Alternative Financing: key performance indicators (1/2)
UK 570 13.4%
1,215
15
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Crowdinvesting raises the highest
average amounts
Alternative Financing: key performance indicators (2/2)
Crowdinvesting Crowdfunding
8,686
6,419
5,168
37 40 45 50 55 59 62
2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Crowdinvesting Crowdfunding
122.6 125.6
119.0
113.5
104.8
92.5
79.2
16
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
Alternative Lending will surpass
US$300 billion by 2021
Alternative Lending: overview (1/2)
The Alternative Lending market segment relates to digital financial services for business customers as
well as private borrowers.
Within the Alternative Lending segment, two types of transactions can be differentiated:
▪ Crowdlending (Business): Bank-independent loan allocation for SMEs1. This is for business
purposes only.
▪ Marketplace Lending (Personal): Bank-independent loan allocation for personal use. This is also
known as peer-to-peer lending.
The lending is done through private or institutional investors via online platforms (e.g. OnDeck,
LendingClub, Prosper). In view of the processing complexity, this market is focused on SMEs1,
freelancers, and private persons.
Bank financing is not considered, neither are any financial aspects that reach beyond the scope of
small and medium-sized enterprises or donation-based crowdfunding models.
The Alternative Lending market is growing at an average annual growth rate of almost 15% from
2017 to 2023. Crowdlending (business) is the biggest segment with 68% (US$107.6bn) of the
transaction value in 2017 and 79% (US$288.3bn) by 2023.
363.1
+14.9%3 347.3
322.3
74.7
286.2 74.2
72.6
241.5 68.5
196.3 62.0
157.5 55.4
273.1 288.3
49.9 249.7
217.6
179.5
140.9
107.6
17
1: Small and medium-sized enterprises 2: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market
Outlook 3: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
China leads the Alternative Lending
market with a share of 90%
Alternative Lending: overview (2/2)
China is expected to remain the biggest market for Alternative Lending between 2017 with 90%
(US$141.6bn) and 2023 with 94% (US$341.2bn) of the global1 market share. Together, China and the
U.S. account for nearly 95% of the global1 transaction value. The third biggest market in 2023 – the
UK – will be far behind China and the U.S. with a transaction value of US$4.8bn. Switzerland and Italy
follow with US$1.5bn and US$0.8bn, respectively.
Switzerland, Denmark and Spain are expected to demonstrate the highest CAGR2 during 2017 and
2023 with 27.4%, 23.7% and 22.9%, respectively, whereas Canada is expected to register the lowest
negative growth with a CAGR of -5.1% during the same period.
Crowdlending (business) is the biggest segment with an average of nearly 79% of the total
transaction value in 2023. However, the average funding per loan is comparatively low for
Marketplace Lending (personal) at US$2,154 in 2023 compared to US$5,699 for Crowdlending
(business) in the same year.
222.4
178.9
141.6
8.0 6.1 8.2 7.3 8.5 8.5 8.8 9.4 8.9 9.8 9.0 10.1 9.0 10.2
18
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook 2: CAGR: Compound Annual
Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
China and the U.S. account for
nearly 95% of the global1 market
Alternative Lending: key performance indicators (1/2)
China 141,633
341,220 15.8%
U.S. 7,978
9,032 2.1%
UK 3,770
4.1%
4,788
Switzerland 349
1,491 27.4%
Italy 310
17.1%
799
Australia 459
632 5.5%
Spain 168
22.9%
577
Japan 417 2.9%
495
France 327 4.4%
424
Singapore 173 12.9%
358
Netherlands 224 6.0%
317
Finland 175 10.4%
317
Germany 259 2.1%
293
Poland 96 20.1%
288
Mexico 111 16.7%
279
Denmark 69 23.7%
247
Russia 101 13.2%
212
South Korea 131 6.8%
194
India 106 3.8%
132
65 7.6%
Brazil 101
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook 2: CAGR: Compound Annual 19
Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Crowdlending (Business) to
disburse >50mn loans by 2023
Alternative Lending: key performance indicators (2/2)
49 51
46
42
37
34 34 35
31 32
29
26
23 24
5,566 5,699
5,424
5,216
4,803
4,157
3,421
20
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
Personal Finance transactions to
surpass US$2.7 trillion by 2023
Personal Finance: overview (1/2)
The Personal Finance market segment relates to digital financial services for private investors and
users.
Within the Personal Finance segment two types of transactions can be differentiated:
▪ Robo-Advisors: Automated investment services that enable private investors to align their
investment strategy or portfolio using automated recommendations, for example via lead
investors, swarm intelligence, social trading, or individually configurable parameters.
▪ Peer-to-Peer Money Transfers: Money transfers made over the internet between private
individuals. Cross-border payments and remittances are the most relevant segments for the
FinTech market.
The following are not included in this segment: domestic Peer-to-Peer transfers & social payments,
non-automated financial advisory, financial planning or broker services and personal finance
management services (PFM) and budgeting managers.
The Personal Finance market is growing at a CAGR1 of 45% from US$288bn in 2017 to US$2678bn by
2023. Robo-Advisors is the biggest segment with 83% (US$238.8bn) of the transaction value in 2017
and 94% (US$2531bn) by 2023.
2,678
147
2,349
134
+45.0%1 1,970
118
1,535
101
1,059 2,531
2,215
83
1,851
606 1,434
66
288 976
50 541
239
2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
21
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year 2: Only includes
countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
The U.S. leads the market through
2023
Personal Finance: overview (2/2)
The U.S. is expected to remain the biggest market for Personal Finance between 2017 with 70%
(US$201.2bn) and 2023 with 57% (US$1,516bn) of the global1 market share. Together, the U.S. and
China will account for nearly 90% of the global1 transaction value by 2023. The third biggest market
in 2023 – the UK – is far behind China and the U.S. with a transaction value of US$63.9bn. Germany
and Canada follow with US$43.4bn and US$17.7bn, respectively.
China, Poland, and the UK are expected to demonstrate the highest CAGR2 between 2017 and 2023,
with 68.8%, 56.5% and 51.2%, respectively, whereas Switzerland is expected to register the weakest
growth with a CAGR2 of 17.3% in the same period.
The market share of Robo-Advisors transactions will grow from 83% in 2017 to 94% by 2023 despite
a decline in average transaction value per user from US$18,447 to US$17,443. This is due to a
massive surge in the number of users, which is expected to reach 145.1 million by 2023 from only
12.9 million in 2017. This equals a CAGR2 of 50%.
1,071
883
768
681
488
441
319
201 185 180
120 150
92 64 91
38 29 43
22
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook 2: CAGR: Compound Annual
Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
China registers a CAGR1 of >100%
2017–2023
Personal Finance: key performance indicators (1/2)
UK 5,347 59.7%
63,966
23
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate/ average growth rate per year
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Robo-Advisor users will surpass 100
million by 2022
Personal Finance: key performance indicators (2/2)
145
122
96
70
45
26
13
20,970 21,582
20,594
19,252
18,447 18,164
17,443
24
1: Only includes countries listed in the Digital Market Outlook
Most prominent FinTech players can
be found in Digital Payments
Key players (1/2)
Crowdinvesting Crowdfunding
25
Especially the Robo-Advisors
segment has many active players
Key players (2/2)
26
Slow revenue migration despite
increased VC investments
Venture capital investments (1/2)
According to estimates by KPMG from February 20181, global FinTech investment increased from
US$9 billion in 2010 to US$31 billion in 2017. The year 2015, however, saw the highest investment
levels with US$47 billion. In Q4 2017, FinTech investment across the Americas amounted to US$5.9
billion in a total of 168 deals; U.S. companies constituted US$5.8 billion of this investment across 149
deals. In the same time period, investments in Europe and Asia reached US$205 billion with 94 deals
and US$748 million with 36 deals, respectively.
Even though activities in the U.S. and Europe are now slowing down, it has been offset by a big surge
in Asia. In fact, the largest FinTech investment in 2017 was secured by the Indian company One97
Communications, which raised US$1.4 billion, at a valuation of about US$7 billion in May 2017. In
May 2018, Alibaba affiliate Ant Financial, from China, raised US$10 billion, at a valuation of about
US$150 billion.
Despite all this investment and speculation about banks facing extinction, however, only 1% of North
American consumer banking revenue has migrated to new digital models, according to a Citibank
report in March 20162.
This is mainly because even though these start-ups use advanced technologies, they have not yet
reached the scale of the incumbent banks. Moreover, the FinTech markets in North America and
Europe do not have a level of digital disruption as high as the Chinese market.
The Chinese FinTech companies led by Ant Financial have managed to gain a significant share of the
market, mainly in third-party payments. This is due to the close integration of FinTech start-ups in the
broader eCommerce ecosystem. A great example is Alibaba, which has managed to leverage its
strong hold on the Chinese eCommerce market and vast capital reserves to aid rapid adoption of
Alipay and other financial products offered by Ant Financial. In fact, according to the Citibank study,
FinTech companies in China have already passed a tipping point in disrupting the banking industry.
This is reflected in the fact that China will surpass the U.S. as the biggest FinTech market by 2023,
according to the Statista Digital Market Outlook estimates.
27
1: The Pulse of Fintech Q4 2017, KPMG; 2: Digital Disruptions
Global investments in FinTech
companies picked up again in 2017
Venture capital investments (2/2)
61%
-47%
47
26%
142% 31
29
25
200%
12
-33%
9
-33%
6
4
28
Source: KPMG Feb 2018
FinTech still has to find its way to
the mainstream services markets
FinTech vs. traditional banks (1/2)
Banks have traditionally been a necessity in the global financial system. However, recent
advancements in digital technology and data mining, failed expectations and continuously eroding
consumer trust in the banking system, as well as accessible venture capital funding and favorable
regulations have all allowed FinTech companies to dilute their importance.
The first phase from 2006 to 2010 saw FinTech companies disrupting large financial institutions. As
the banks started to respond to the challenges thrown at them, we got to witness the second phase
in 2010 to 2014, in which banks and start-ups began to collaborate and develop interoperable
systems. From 2017 onwards, the entire structure of the financial services industry has been on the
cusp of change, driving the integration of services and systems.
Despite the mass of investments and activity in innovation labs, however, most FinTech companies
have not yet been able to achieve their desired scale of operations, which has caused a recent
slowdown in venture capital funding.
There are positive signs for some FinTech firms, which are beginning to find their niche, especially the
ones developing technologies such as blockchain, which result in significant cost savings. Blockchain
solutions in the areas of payment authorization, settlement and international transfers are expected
to experience fast and widespread adoption. Others with viable business models in areas such as
investment management are expected to keep eating away at the market share of traditional
providers and creating new markets, as a lot of people with lower and medium incomes that
previously never had access to affordable investment advice now do.
29
Source: AgileIntel Research
Will traditional banks prevail
through disruption by FinTechs?
FinTech vs. traditional banks (2/2)
A lot of people have not yet heard of FinTech but certainly use some of the services and products
provided by FinTech companies, like internet payment services and mobile payments. Increasing and
guaranteeing security will help broaden the awareness and drive usage of FinTech products and
services.
While FinTech players have driven down cost and thus made it beneficial for all parties involved to
use their products, they have not managed to strip down their fee structure to an easily comparable
level. While borrowers can get their rating and resulting interest rates in minutes from FinTech
lenders, they will be hard pressed to quickly find the best deal for them similar to the old established
banking world, as fee structures and fine print vary from provider to provider.
Additionally, most FinTech providers focus on only one or two segments, unlike traditional banks,
which usually have a very broad product offering. This makes it necessary for customers to either
choose one of the few (almost) “full-service” providers like SoFi, which offers lending and wealth
management, or register with a lot of companies driving up the complexity of and the time
consumed by their finance management.
The rising number of investments by traditional banks and their adoption of FinTech technology
shows that they are aware of the risks and opportunities provided by these new developments.
The main question is whether the old banks will prevail by adopting new technologies and
successfully changing enough to shake off most of the new competitors by virtue of their sheer size
or whether FinTech start-ups will overtake the old system almost entirely.
30
Selected business & revenue
models
The digital payment and lending businesses, including mobile wallets, P2P
payments, alternative lending, cryptocurrencies and robo-advisors, are now
finding mainstream acceptance in both developed and emerging countries.
Broadly speaking, there are three types of players in the digital commerce
payments market: providers with their own wallet such as Venmo and PayPal,
online payment interface providers such as Stripe, and B2B offline payment
providers such as Square. These providers make money by charging fees for
each transaction, which is usually paid by the merchant.
Alternative lenders and robo-advisors make their money by either charging
service fees from borrowers and investors or transaction fees from the bank.
31
Digital Payments are driven by a
growing eCommerce market
Digital Payments: overview (1/2)
Digital payment methods have brought change to the payments industry traditionally dominated by
debit cards, credit cards, checks, cash, and prepaid cards. The surge of smart devices and a booming
global eCommerce market are the major factors driving the rapid adoption of digital payment types.
Most new payment solutions offer an instant transfer of money via the web through various channels
such as mobile phones, tablets, and digital wallets.
Even though the U.S. alternative payments market is dominated by PayPal, Venmo and Square,
technology giants such as Facebook, Google and Apple, as well as large banks such as JP Morgan
Chase and Wells Fargo are also pushing into the market. The ultimate goal of the industry is to
reduce transaction costs, increase the speed of money transfers, facilitate the rise of global
eCommerce, and weave payments into the very fabric of social networking.
The total Digital Payments transaction value in the U.S. is expected to cross US$978.9 billion by 2019
according to the Statista Digital Market Outlook. Digital Commerce constitutes US$891.3 billion
(91%), Mobile POS Payments US$87.6 billion (9%).
Operating model
Destination/
Payment sources Payment platform providers beneficiaries
32
Source: Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Digital Payments has seen a lot of
innovation over the past few years
Digital Payments: overview (2/2)
Various retail payment innovations have gained traction over the past few years, including:
▪ Mobile wallets: A virtual wallet that lets businesses and individuals send and receive money
through mobile devices.
▪ P2P mobile payments: They allow individuals to transfer money from their bank account or credit
card to another individual's account through a mobile phone.
▪ Foreign exchange payments: Companies like TransferWise and Xoom allow consumers to transfer
money to or pay bills for family and friends around the world, using their mobiles, tablets, or
computers.
▪ Real-time payments: Payments that are cleared in real time or close to it, irrespective of the
payment instrument used.
▪ Cryptocurrencies: these payment methods exist only in electronic form and are not tangible.
Infrastructure needed to support such currencies at scale is still being developed. Examples
include Bitcoin, Ether and Ripple.
The digital commerce market is fragmented with a lot of different players. In general, there are three
types of players in the broader digital commerce business:
▪ B2C payment methods with an own wallet: These system allow consumers to pay in online shops
with money stored in a digital wallet. The digital wallet can be filled by credit/debit card
transactions or bank transfers or when friends transfer money from their own digital wallet.
Example companies are Venmo and PayPal.
▪ B2B online payment providers: These are interfaces to connect online shops with payment
providers, e.g. credit/debit cards or online payment methods like PayPal and Alipay. These
interfaces are easy to implement for the online shop operators and allow them to add new
payment methods to their offering. The customer usually does not specifically know which
payment provider is used, but rather focuses on the payment methods that are offered via the
provider. An example company here would be Stripe.
▪ B2B offline payment providers: They offer an interface to connect offline shops with payment
providers and are not included in the Digital Commerce segment of the Statista Digital Market
Outlook1. Where before only cash payments were possible and credit/debit card payments
required expensive machines with high transaction fees for the merchants, start-ups now offer
point-of-sale online payments including all payment methods, e.g. PayPal and Apple Pay. One
provider for point-of-sale solutions is Square, which offers various devices to allow businesses to
process card and mobile payments as well as other online payment methods.
33
1: Payments are only included if they are done via mobile payments like Apple Pay that might be
supported by the payment providers
Revenue models are mainly based
on transaction fees for merchants
Digital Payments: revenues & fees
Generally, the revenue model of digital payment providers is based on charging fees for each
transaction, which are usually paid by the merchant. In most cases, the fees are a certain percentage
of the transaction value but can also include a per-transaction-fee component. Users are sometimes
charged a fee if they use specific payment methods such as credit cards.
1: A PayPal company 2: Fee is based on the currency of the payment 3: €0.25 4: Credit & debit
cards 5: Automated Clearing House – an electronic network for financial transactions in the U.S. 34
6: Max. US$5 7: Payments by card where magnet stripe or chip is read by the square device, or
via mobile phone
PayPal reached more than US$13
billion in revenues in 2017
Digital Payments: PayPal vs. Square
PayPal is one of the big players in the digital payments landscape. The PayPal platform provides
digital commerce and P2P money transfer capabilities and includes companies like Venmo, Braintree,
and Zoom. It is available in more than 200 markets worldwide. Mobile and in-store payments are
available in some countries as well.
Square, on the other hand, provides a point-of-sale payment infrastructure that allows businesses to
accept credit/debit card payments, as well as mobile payments via Apple Pay or Android Pay. Square
is available in the U.S., Canada, Japan, Australia, and the UK.
While PayPal’s and Venmo’s fee structure varies depending on the country the merchant operates in
and takes into account the country where the payment is issued and the currency, Square charges a
fee depending on whether the transaction is processed automatically or manually keyed into the
Square software.
When comparing revenue streams of PayPal and Square, it becomes obvious that PayPal’s global
reach is a key reason for their significantly higher revenue. Additionally, Square has to convince
merchants and stores to use their technology instead of the existing and wide-spread credit card
terminals, or focus on smaller merchants and stores that cannot yet afford them.
PayPal Square
13,090
10,840
9,250
8,030
6,730
5,990
2,214
1,709
1,267
552 850
203
35
Source: Company Press Release
Alternative Lending in China works
differently compared to the U.S.
Alternative Lending: overview
Consumer and business loans in the FinTech space are mostly carried out by lending platforms,
which operate as marketplaces linking borrowers to lenders. This means that unlike banks, which
accept deposits and lend to consumers and businesses, these lenders do not take deposits or lend
themselves. They take no risk onto their own balance sheets, and therefore receive no interest
income directly from borrowers.
The main USP of these companies is to decrease the borrowing cost for borrowers and increase
returns for lenders or investors as well as to enable a lot of consumers to get a loan in the first place.
Marketplace lenders primarily target consumers and small businesses that are unserved or under-
served by traditional banks, thereby operating only at the lower end of the market. The high net
worth individuals who form the core of the market still turn to banks or other traditional investment
managers for financial advice.
According to estimates by Citi, it is credit card loans, student loans and SME financing that constitute
most of the market for FinTech lenders, which is pegged at about US$254 billion or 8% of the total
U.S. consumer credit market potential.
The marketplace lending model in China has differences to the U.S. and European systems. Chinese
firms mostly operate on an online-to-offline model in which investors are sourced online but
borrowers are served offline through partnerships with non-bank financial institutions or by their
own agents.
In the U.S., on the contrary, alternative lending is almost entirely based on an online model.
LendingClub, Prosper and SoFi are the three major FinTech players in the U.S. in this segment.
36
Source: Citi
Profiteers are borrowers, market-
places, banks and investors alike
Alternative Lending: Marketplace Lending
Since marketplaces do not take any deposits or lend their own money, they do not receive an
interest income. Instead, they earn their revenues from fees and commissions generated by
matching borrowers with lenders.
There are mainly two types of fees that marketplaces profit from:
▪ Service fees for borrowers and investors, e.g. late payment fees, check payment fees, and service
fees based on invested capital
In some cases (e.g. LendingClub), origination fees contribute the greatest part to the revenue. In
2015, they accounted for almost 88% of the platform’s operating revenue. Often investors have to
pay a service fee based on their payments or the amount invested as well.
Borrowers
Issuing bank
Marketplace lending (personal)
Investors
1: Includes determination of loan interest rates, based on a prior credit scoring 2: Including 37
initially agreed interest rate 3: Interest rate is based on credit worthiness of marketplace and
therefore lower than for individual borrowers, the interest rate includes the origination fee
Robo-advisors offer algorithm-
based investments and advice
Personal Finance: Robo-Advisors (1/2)
Robo-advisors are automated investment platforms that offer investment advice by leveraging client
information and algorithms. When signing up for the service, investors are first asked to answer a
series of questions about the amount they’re looking to invest, their risk tolerance and expected
returns. The platforms then usually assign each investor a risk category from 1–10. This number is
then used by algorithms to put the investment into various asset classes, often low-cost exchange-
traded funds (ETFs). Robo-advisors also rebalance the portfolios at regular time intervals and offer
extra services such as tax loss harvesting. Companies are now looking to enhance their know-how in
big data and analytics to deliver more personalized and specific investment advice.
Even though the industry has experienced a strong growth since the first robo-advisors were
launched, their current market share is marginal and mainly concentrated in the lower end of the
market. Deloitte classifies robo-advisors according to their capabilities (see below) and says that, as
at August 2016, around 80% of robo-advisors in the U.S., Germany, the UK and the EU have 3.0
capabilities.
The Statista Digital Market Outlook forecasts the total assets under management by robo-advisors in
the U.S. to increase from US$189.5 billion in 2017 to US$1,486.3 billion by 2023. However, these
market players are still nascent and contribute only a small share to the overall U.S. investable assets
market, which currently values over US$33 trillion, according to estimates by Deloitte.
Robo-advisory evolution
4.0
3.0 ▪ Fully automated
2.0 ▪ Algorithm-based investments
1.0 ▪ Dedicated fund adjustments & ▪ Self-learning
management rebalancing algorithms
▪ Online
▪ Automatic asset
questionnaire ▪ Managed proposals
adjustments & ▪ Pre-defined shifts
▪ Product or
rebalancing investment rules
portfolio
proposal
▪ Funds of funds
& portfolio view
▪ Listed ETFs, ▪ Risk-based
bonds, shares portfolio
allocation
Source: Deloitte
38
Source: Deloitte, Statista Digital Market Outlook 2018
Robo-advisors attract customers
with significantly lower fees
Personal Finance: Robo-Advisors (2/2)
The revenue model of robo-advisors is based on significantly lower fees as compared to traditional
investment management firms. They can afford this as they use low-cost investment vehicles like
ETFs.
The main U.S. companies in this space include Betterment, Wealthfront, SoFi, and FutureAdvisor, all
of whom charge their clients between 0.15% and 0.5% per year, depending on the amount invested.
Investors also pay ETF expense fees at times, which range from 0% to 0.15%.
These advisors also provide for low account minimums and services such as tax-loss harvesting,
which were previously only available to big investors.
Vanguard 101,000
Schwab Intelligent
27,000
Portfolios
Betterment 13,500
Wealthfront 10,200
E*Trade 3,900
Wealthsimple 1,500
Acorns 550
Fidelity Go 190
Source: Various sources (Financial Samurai)
39
1: Assets under management 2: Information based on latest available data, as at June 2018
Robo-advisors mainly invest in
vehicles with low fees
Robo-Advisors: comparison to traditional wealth management
Traditional wealth
Parameters Robo-advisors management companies
▪ Algorithm-based investment ▪ Individual portfolio management by
Business advice bank, company, or institution
model ▪ Portfolio management advisor
▪ Low-fee stock and bond index ▪ Classic vehicle types (stocks, bonds,
funds, usually ETFs ETFs, mutual funds)
Investment ▪ Structured products
vehicles ▪ Alternative investments
40
Source: Company information, press releases
Betterment is the only robo-advisor
with a single-stock diversification
Robo-Advisors: company comparison
Product/service
offerings
Account aggregation ✓ ✓
Asset allocation ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Individual stocks ✓ ✓ ✓
Single-stock
✓
diversification
Automated rebalancing ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Automated deposits/
✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
transfers
Dividend reinvestment ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Tax-loss harvesting ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
41
Source: Company information
Deep dive: P2P Money Transfer
Currently, the Statista Digital Market Outlook focuses on international P2P
money transfers. This deep dive chapter looks at both domestic and
international digital transfers, including those for micro-services and bill
sharing for the U.S., the UK, India, and China.
The U.S. P2P payments market is among the biggest globally. The market is
expected to increase from US$151bn in 2017 to US$381bn by 2022. The most
dominant players are Zelle, Venmo, and Square. The Indian P2P payments
market is among the most exciting and fastest-growing globally, poised to
increase at an overall average annual growth rate of over 72% from US$10.5bn
in 2017 to US$159.2bn by 2022.
42
The U.S. P2P payments market will
reach US$381bn by 2022
U.S.
The U.S. P2P payments market for both domestic and international digital transfers, including those
for micro-services and bill sharing, is among the biggest globally.
The market is expected to increase at an overall CAGR1 of over 20% from US$151bn in 2017 to
US$381bn by 2022. The market is also hugely competitive with both financial institutions and FinTech
start-ups offering innovative digital P2P services and building interoperable networks that execute
real-time payments.
In fact, Zelle is owned by a consortium of U.S. banks including Bank of America, BB&T, Capital One,
JPMorgan Chase, PNC Bank, US Bank, SunTrust, and Wells Fargo, and had the highest gross
transaction value among all companies in the market in 2017 with around US$40bn2.
The other dominant players in this space are Venmo, owned by PayPal, which moved around
US$35bn in P2P payments in 2017, and Square.
The recent momentum in the U.S. P2P payments market has not only been accompanied by a
proliferation of innovative solutions by start-ups and financial institutions, but also by large
technology companies such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Samsung, who are looking to leverage
their technological superiority and vast existing user base to make a foray into this fast-growing
market.
381
332
+20.3%1
284
236
192
151
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year, 2: Zelle moved 43
US$75bn in 2017, but out of this around US$35bn were B2B and C2B transactions
Source: AgileIntel Research
UK P2P payments market will
surpass US$50bn by 2020
UK
The UK’s P2P payments1 industry is worth US$25bn in 2017, with an expected increase to US$70bn
by 2022, corresponding to a a CAGR2 of 23%. Being one of the hottest markets for FinTech
innovations globally, the UK is currently seeing a plethora of P2P-related innovations from incumbent
banks and start-ups alike.
For example, challenger banks Revolut and Monzo have launched location-based P2P payment
services, a feature that has faced adoption hurdles even in mature markets like the US.
Interestingly, apart from homegrown companies such as Paym, Pingit (owned by Barclays) and
TransferWise, international companies such as PayPal and Facebook have started to utilize their large
millennial user bases to make a strong foray into the market.
70
60
+22.7%2
51
42
33
25
1: Includes both domestic and international digital transfers including those for micro-services 44
and bill sharing 2: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year
Source: AgileIntel Research
Indian P2P payments market is
growing at a CAGR1 of over 70%
India
The Indian P2P payments market2 is among the most exciting and fastest-growing globally, poised to
increase at an overall CAGR1 of over 72% from US$10.5bn in 2017 to US$159.2bn by 2022. The
market is expected to almost double each year up to the year 2019, then slowing down to grow at
just over 40% up to 2022. Radical government reforms, especially the demonetization efforts of
November 2016 and the subsequent launch of Unified Payments Interface (UPI), a government-
owned payments platform, are its two biggest drivers.
Interestingly, global card companies such as Visa and Mastercard are steadily losing their market
share to digital payment start-ups in India, with UPI transactions having already crossed half the value
of card transactions in the country.
The main companies in this space are Paytm, PhonePe, Google’s Tez, Mobikwik and Freecharge, with
both Paytm and PhonePe expecting to double their transaction values in 2018. The market has also
received the required impetus with WhatsApp launching its P2P payments service in February 2018,
and Facebook gearing up to do the same early in 2019.
159
112
+72.2%1
73
44
23
11
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year, 2: Includes both 45
domestic and international digital transfers including those for micro-services and bill sharing
Source: AgileIntel Research
Mexican P2P payments market will
reach US$14bn by 2022
Mexico
Just like the Indian market, P2P payments2 in Mexico are poised for robust growth through 2022,
increasing from US$2bn in 2017 to US$14bn by 2022, which is a CAGR of almost 50%. One of the
main factors driving this growth is that Mexico has one of the most diverse financial services
landscapes in all of Latin America, including over 250 FinTech companies. In fact, according to start-
up accelerator Finnovista, 35% of all FinTech companies in Latin America that aim to serve people
neglected by the larger banks are based in Mexico.
Furthermore, the increasing adoption of smartphones, the growing general internet penetration and,
most importantly, a vast unmet need of customer-centric payment products are steadily creating a
market ripe for digital disruption.
Key companies operating in this space include both homegrown and international companies, such
as Openpay, Billmo, PayPal, and Obopay.
14
11
+47.6%1
8
3
2
1: CAGR: Compound Annual Growth Rate / average growth rate per year, 2. Includes both 46
domestic and international digital transfers including those for micro-services and bill sharing
Source: AgileIntel Research
Deep dive: blockchain
Blockchain is a distributed ledger technology that can be used to execute,
store, and verify transactions of every kind. Its main uses are in money
transfer, buying and selling stocks, insurance contracts, and buying and
selling physical goods or energy.
Blockchain funding is still going up with over 144 start-ups managing to raise
US$640 million in funding in 2017.
Cryptocurrencies are probably the most well-known adoption of blockchain
technology. Bitcoin, emerging in 2009, is by far the oldest and the most widely
used cryptocurrency in the world. It also has the highest market capitalization
and highest value per unit at the moment.
47
Blockchain uses vast networks to
store and verify transactions
Blockchain technology (1/3)
Blockchain is a distributed ledger technology that can be used to execute, store, and verify
transactions of every kind. It allows parties to make and verify transactions or contracts instantly
without the approval of a central authority. There are a lot of potential use cases for this technology,
among else:
▪ Money transfer
▪ Insurance contracts
Blockchain essentially uses cryptography and complex algorithms to allow transactions to be shared
across a network of computers and then be authenticated by the participants in the network. The
concept of blockchain was first mentioned in a paper by Satoshi Nakamoto about Bitcoin in 2008.
Bitcoin was also the first publicly shared blockchain. This brings us to two things that are often
mentioned in relation to blockchains:
▪ Cryptocurrencies: Cryptocurrencies are often used as a synonym for blockchain, although they are
usually merely the result of one. Most existing blockchains are directly connected to a
cryptocurrency that is used to recompense people who contribute to the blockchain.
▪ Smart contracts: A smart contract is an electronic contract that monitors contractual rules and
clauses and can trigger pre-defined events automatically. One example would be a contract
between two parties to sell and buy stocks. Party A wants to buy stocks from party B at a specific
date for a specific amount of money. They agree on a contract that is automatically executed on
the given date. Blockchain technology makes smart contracts like this a lot easier and faster.
Broadly speaking, there are three types of blockchains: public, private, and consortium.
▪ Public: Also called “permissionless”, these blockchains are fully decentralized. They are open to
everyone, thereby allowing them to read or write data from or to the ledger. Bitcoin is an example
of a public network.
▪ Private: These blockchains involve restricted access to the network with only an organization or a
few users having the right to modify or read the blockchain state. Financial institutions all over the
world have shown considerable interest in private blockchains over the years to carry out
functions such as database management and auditing. The Hyperledger Project and R3's Corda
are examples of private blockchains.
▪ Consortium: These networks are controlled by a consortium of companies or institutions and are
different from private blockchains by virtue of the method of consensus. Being partially
centralized, the right to read these blockchains could be either private or public.
So how does blockchain work? This is not easily answered, as all blockchains use different methods
to achieve the same result: instant transactions and decentralized verification and storage. To
describe the blockchain technology in broad and general terms, we use the example of money
transfer. Party A wants to transfer money to party B. Both need to be members of a blockchain and
thus have both a private and a public key for the encryption.
48
Currently, two ways are used to
verify blockchain transactions
Blockchain technology (2/3)
Party A can only transfer the money to party B if it knows B’s public key and if B verifies the
transaction with its own private key. In terms of today’s banking, in the case of money transfer the
public key functions as a kind of account number and the private keys are like PINs. Once the
transaction is verified by both parties, it is encrypted with both parties’ public and private keys and
written into a block of transaction by the blockchain.
The block is filled with a lot of transactions, and once it is full, it is verified as a block by the members
of the blockchain and then encrypted and attached to the last block of the chain – hence the name.
The encryption key of the block is then derived by its own transactions and part of the key of the
previous block. At this stage it is not possible to change the block anymore.
This is important for the security of the blockchain, as it defines the order of the blocks and ensures
that transactions in a block cannot be changed retroactively. A retroactive change of a transaction
would require a change of the key and thus the whole blockchain in order to mask the manipulation.
One thing that is essential in a blockchain network are members who verify and store the blocks. As
the blockchain is stored and verified by many people, it is decentralized and hard to manipulate,
since you would have to manipulate the blockchain as stored by all of its members. As mentioned
before, blockchain technology incentivizes and rewards its members by giving them tokens for their
work in the blockchain. Usually, members get these tokens like Bitcoin or Ether (the token of the
blockchain Ethereum) when they verify blocks. These tokens often also have to be paid to conduct a
transaction in a blockchain. In order to balance the number of members needed to verify a block
with the number of blocks that need to be verified, blockchains currently use two different methods:
▪ Proof-of-work: As members need a certain amount of computational power to verify the encrypted
blocks, they need to solve a cryptographic puzzle first. Those puzzles are usually easy to validate,
but take computational power to solve. The first members to solve the puzzle are then allowed to
verify – or, as it is often called in blockchains, mine – the blocks. This method is used by Bitcoin, for
example.
▪ Proof-of-stake: Here the verification work is randomly distributed based on the wealth of the
members of the blockchain, e.g. the amount of the associated tokens that they are holding.
Certain measures are taken to prevent only the most wealthy being allowed to verify blocks – or,
as it is called in proof-of-stake verification, forge them. This verification method is used by
Ethereum, for example.
A verification only takes place if a certain high share of members agree on its authenticity and thus
achieve a consensus. Verification of a block takes from a few seconds to minutes depending on the
blockchain, the numbers of transactions and members of the blockchain to verify the blocks. Both
verification ways have certain pros and cons attached to them in terms of their incentives, security,
and effectiveness. Proof-of-work verification, for instance, requires a lot of energy, as it consumes
computational power and is thus not very cost-effective. There is also a lot of discussion on how to
ensure that members of blockchains verify correctly and to punish those who don’t.
49
Transactions in a blockchain rely on
consensus verification
Blockchain technology (3/3)
Transaction is encrypted
2
Transaction: x&zh98%thgs98001
50
1: The encryption key of the block
Over US$550m in blockchain and
Bitcoin start-up funding
Funding
Investment in blockchain and Bitcoin start-ups continued its upward trajectory in 2017. According to
CB Insights, over 144 start-ups managed to raise US$640 million in funding in 20171, which
corresponds to a growth of 16% compared to 2016. Compared to US$1.3 million in 2012, the
funding increased by a factor of nearly 500.
Digital Currency Group held the top slot with more than 100 investments in more than 75 Bitcoin
and blockchain start-ups between 2012 and 2017, including investments in leading start-ups such as
Circle, Coinbase, and Ripple. In the same period, blockchain Capital claimed the second rank in
Bitcoin and blockchain funding.
640
545
525
357
93
1
2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Source: CB Insights, as at August 2017
51
1: Equity funding (excluding altcoins and initial coin offerings) as at August 10, 2017
Source: CB Insights
Investment in Bitcoin would have
outperformed other strategies
Bitcoin, Ethereum & co. (1/3)
Cryptocurrencies are expected to play a major role in the future of money. Bitcoin, emerging in 2009,
is by far the oldest and the most widely used cryptocurrency in the world. Bitcoin as a currency
attracted worldwide attention in 2013 when it surpassed the US$1,000 per unit threshold. There are
around 1,500 cryptocurrencies that have emerged since 2013, out of which around 600 are actively
traded around the world. According to a recent study led by Abeer ElBahrawy at the City University in
London, the cryptocurrency market is currently worth US$54 billion. This is however very small
compared to US$80.9 trillion, the total amount of money in circulation in the world in 2015,
according to the CIA Factbook.
The demand for Bitcoin has been growing at an exponential rate since 2011. In a typical market
condition, the Bitcoin payoff for US$100 invested in January 2011 would be worth 20,553 times more
in June 2018.
Although the market capitalization of Bitcoin is on the rise and currently stands at US$113.4 billion,
other leading cryptocurrencies are also gaining traction, especially Ethereum and Ripple (XRP), with a
current valuation of US$21.3 billion and US$18.5 billion, respectively1.
While Bitcoin, at US$6,543 per coin, is very valuable as a currency as well, a high market capitalization
for other cryptocurrencies does not automatically mean a high value as a currency. The third largest
cryptocurrency from a market capitalization point of view, Ripple (XRP), for example, is worth only
US$0.46, while Litecoin, the number 7 on the current market capitalization list, is worth US$53.21.
Bitcoin payoff development for US$100 investment from Jan ‘11 to Jun ‘18 in
US$
6,594,267
2,055,313
52
1: Market capitalizations and values as at October 21, 2018 on CoinMarketCap
Source: Investopedia
Leading cryptocurrencies
Bitcoin, Ethereum & co. (2/3)
Various cryptocurrencies gained traction over the last few years, including:
▪ Bitcoin: a decentralized digital currency without a central bank or single administrator, which can
be sent from user to user on the peer-to-peer Bitcoin network without the need for
intermediaries.
▪ XRP (Ripple): a real-time gross settlement system, currency exchange and remittance network built
upon a distributed open source internet protocol. It supports tokens representing fiat currency,
cryptocurrency, commodities, or other units of value such as frequent flier miles or mobile
minutes. It is based on a shared public ledger, the XRP Ledger, which uses a consensus process
that allows for payments, exchanges and remittance in a distributed process.
▪ EOS: a blockchain protocol powered by the native cryptocurrency EOS. EOS operates as a smart
contract platform and decentralized operating system intended for the deployment of industrial-
scale decentralized applications through a decentralized autonomous corporation model.
▪ Stellar: an open-source, decentralized protocol for digital-to-fiat currency transfers, which allows
cross-border transactions between any pair of currencies.
▪ Litecoin: a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency and open source software project released under the
MIT/X11 license. Creation and transfer of coins is based on an open source cryptographic protocol
and is not managed by any central authority.
▪ Tether: a cryptocurrency that is backed by the U.S. dollar. It is designed to always be worth US$1.0.
▪ Cardano: a distributed computing platform that runs the blockchain for the Ada cryptocurrency.
Coins are minted and decisions are made via a proof-of-stake algorithm called Ouroboros instead
of a proof-of-work system; consensus is generated by coin-holder vote.
▪ Monero: an open-source cryptocurrency that focuses on fungibility and decentralization. It uses a
special kind of public ledger where anybody can broadcast or send transactions, but no outside
observer can tell what the source, amount or destination are. Monero uses a proof-of-work
mechanism to issue new coins and incentivize miners to secure the network and validate
transactions.
53
Source: Company Website
Bitcoin has by far the biggest
market capitalization
Bitcoin, Ethereum & co. (3/3)
113.4
21.3
18.5
7.8
5.0
4.6
3.1
2.1
2.0
1.7
6,543.0
207.6
0.5
450.1
5.5
0.2
53.2
1.0
0.1
105.9
54
Bitcoin: from the first transaction to
a US$1 billion market in 4 years
Evolution of blockchain (1/3)
2010 May: Laslo Hanyecz makes the first real-world transaction with Bitcoin
June: The first major theft takes place, Bitcoin Forum founder reports
2011 loss of 25,000 Bitcoins
U.S. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network issued guidance report
2013 on using virtual currencies
55
Source: Company information, Press releases
Blockchain technology gets adopted
by governments and private players
Evolution of blockchain (2/3)
56
1: It was only a US$29 investment as a gesture to recognize Bitcoin
Source: Company information, press releases
Major and state banks adopt
blockchain technology
Evolution of blockchain (3/3)
April: ANZ Banking Group, BNP Paribas, BNY Mellon, DBS Bank, RBC
2017 Royal Bank, and Wells Fargo team up to use blockchain
May: Gibraltar proposes new government regulatory framework for
digital currency
May: Norwegian bank Skandianbanken rolls out a new feature which
allows customers to integrate their Bitcoin wallets
October: Fujitsu announces its plans to conduct a joint trial of P2P
money transfer service using blockchain with three Japanese banks
Oct.: Monetary Authority of Singapore and The Association of Banks in
Singapore (ABS) develop blockchain tech for inter-bank payments
March: South Korean-based crypto exchange Bithumb announces
2018 plans to supply crypto kiosks to restaurants
April: SK Telecom, South Korea announces the release of an asset
management service with blockchain technology
May: Goldman Sachs announces its plan to start its operations in
Bitcoin trading
May: Money Forward Inc., the Japanese personal budgeting app,
announces its plans to launch a crypto asset exchange in 2018
May: New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) plans to offer Bitcoin (BTC)
swap contracts
57
Source: Company information, Press releases
Blockchain technology could
overcome challenges in banking
Blockchain adoption by banks
For many years, banks around the world have been trying to overcome limitations imposed by
traditional monetary policies. The current system has security issues and is costly to maintain. The
simple matter of sending money abroad currently takes days, sometimes weeks, with middlemen
collecting substantial fees. Regulations require banks to record everything from stock trades to
money transfer, resulting in huge compliance costs.
Using blockchain technology can result in significant savings since no third party clearing is needed.
In fact, a report from Santander InnoVentures claims that by 2022 blockchain technologies are
expected to reduce banks’ infrastructural costs by US$15–20 billion a year by replacing ACH1
transaction processing.
In a study on 200 banks around the world titled “Leading the pack in blockchain banking - Trailblazers
set the pace” from September 2016, IBM found that 15% of banks expect to have blockchains in
commercial production in 2017, with the number increasing to 66% by 2020. Most of these banks
were medium-sized to large institutions and will be focusing on three areas:
▪ Reference data
▪ Retail payments
▪ Consumer lending
Many Top U.S. and European banks are now investing a significant amount of resources to explore
the potential of blockchain technology by forming partnerships with start-ups or creating innovation
labs.
One such example is the consortium started by R3, which has attracted 43 global banks including JP
Morgan, Northern Trust, Goldman Sachs, BNY Mellon, Citigroup, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley,
and Wells Fargo in the U.S. Their goal is to develop common standards for the adoption of
blockchain technology in the traditional banking system. In October 2016, R3 along with eight
member banks announced a successful test of a blockchain platform for bond transactions.
58
1: Automated Clearing House – an electronic network for financial transactions in the U.S.
Source: IBM
Bank of America holds around 40
blockchain-related patents
Key blockchain developments in the banking industry (1/4)
BNY Mellon, along with Deutsche Bank, Santander and UBS, are aiming to
launch their own commercial-grade blockchain system by 2018. The banks have
3 partnered with London-based blockchain start-up Clearmatics to advance what
they are calling "the Utility Settlement Coin concept”.
As part of the R3-distributed ledger consortium, BNY Mellon has developed the
“BDS 360” test solution, which uses blockchain technology to create a backup
5 record of its brokerage transactions. The system functions alongside the bank’s
existing transaction records system to create another parallel dataset to be
used in case of the primary set not being available.
59
Source: Company information, press releases
Ripple might challenge SWIFT as the
global settlement standard
Key blockchain developments in the banking industry (2/4)
In September 2016, Barclays made its first ever blockchain-based trade finance
9 transaction, using the platform of the start-up Wave.
In October 2016, ICICI Bank signaled the arrival of blockchain technology in India
by executing transactions in international trade finance and remittance using
11 blockchain technology in partnership with Emirates NBD, a Middle Eastern
banking group.
In October 2016, Bank of China and HSBC announced plans to launch mortgage
services using blockchain in Hong Kong. According to Duncan Wong, VP of
12 financial technologies at Astri, a government-backed research institute: “To the
best of our knowledge, this will be the first production-grade [blockchain]
mortgage system to integrate with a bank.”
60
Source: Company information, press releases
Some national banks plan to issue
digital versions of their currencies
Key blockchain developments in the banking industry (3/4)
Nine global banks including State Street, U.S. Bank, Wells Fargo, BBVA, Danske
Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland, Scotiabank and Société Générale are testing
blockchain and smart contract technologies to see if they can improve the
15 syndicated loan market. They are seeking to prove that processing loan data
exclusively on a blockchain could eliminate the cost for each to maintain their
own lending system.
In Jan 2017, the Indian central bank, Reserve Bank of India, in partnership with
MonetaGo, domestic banks and other financial institutions, tested blockchain
17 technology for trade applications. Moreover, other private banks including ICICI
Bank, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Yes Bank have also started testing
blockchain technology solutions to use in their operations.
61
Source: Company information, press releases
Ripple is being used in tests in
Japan and England
Key blockchain developments in the banking industry (4/4)
In Feb 2017, BSP, the Philippine Central Bank, announced its plans to officially
18 regulate local Philippine Bitcoin exchanges as remittance companies and
recognize Bitcoin as a legitimate payment method.
In March 2017, the Bank of England partnered with Ripple to test blockchain-
20 based technology that would make cross-border payments and the movement
of currencies faster.
In April 2017, ANZ Banking Group, BNP Paribas, BNY Mellon, DBS Bank, RBC
21 Royal Bank and Wells Fargo teamed up with Swift to develop a way of using
blockchain to help banks monitor their overseas accounts.
In May 2017, Norwegian bank Skandianbanken started rolling out a new feature
22 which allows customers to integrate their Bitcoin wallets into their account.
In October 2017, Fujitsu announced its plans to work with Mizuho Financial
Group, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG) and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial
24 Group (MUFG) to conduct a joint field trial of a person-to-person (P2P) money
transfer service using blockchain.
In May 2018, Goldman Sachs announced its plan to start operations in Bitcoin
26 trading. In the beginning, Goldman Sachs will use its own funds to trade Bitcoin
futures on behalf of clients.
62
Source: Company information, press releases
Blockchain disruption potential
goes beyond payments
Future of blockchain (1/2)
When blockchain first emerged, it was considered elusive and sometimes even illegal. Its use in
mainstream banking wasn’t even considered a possibility. However, the results of a recent survey by
the World Economic Forum (WEF) show that most experts now believe that blockchain will become
mainstream by 2025.
One of the main drivers of blockchain technology growth is the fact that the infrastructure required
for rapid blockchain adoption is already present. Technology advancements in smartphones,
embedded sensors, large computing power and machine algorithms are all expected to enhance this
growth. Moreover, most banks and government authorities have realized that blockchain technology
has the potential to strengthen the global financial system by reducing costs, enhancing
transparency, saving time, and cutting down risk.
You all have read about Bitcoin, merchants building their own networks,
PayPal and PayPal look-alikes. Payments are a critical business for us —
and we are quite good at it. But there is much for us to learn in terms of
real-time systems, better encryption techniques, and reduction of costs and
'pain points' for customers.
We have already discussed the use of blockchain to facilitate payments. However, there are more
opportunities for banks to use the blockchain technology to improve services. For example, UBS is
exploring a range of applications such as smart bonds, cross-border payment transactions and a
digital representation of physical currency.
Another area which may be disrupted by blockchain technology is transactions between parties at
different banks, with Lehmann saying that the bank could potentially replace the traditional letter of
credit with a blockchain alternative. In fact, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, HSBC and the Infocomm
Development Authority of Singapore have already developed a blockchain-enabled application that
could be used by exporters and importers to share information among themselves and with their
banks. This would then enable them to execute a trade deal simply through a series of digital smart
contracts, thus significantly reducing the cost of international trade.
63
More blockchain solutions expected
in the future
Future of blockchain (2/2)
In the coming years, banks and other financial institutions are expected to collaborate among
themselves and with FinTech companies to enhance interoperability of various blockchain solutions
across the financial ecosystem.
According to a Cognizant study, the main focus areas of new product development would be
▪ International payments
▪ Trading activities
▪ Custody services
I don’t know what’s going to succeed. What I’m certain of is that we are
going to see blockchain solutions, peer-to-peer solutions emerging in our
industry and we want to be close to that development.
64
Source: Cognizant
Case study: Ant Financial
Ant Financial, the most highly valued FinTech company in the world, is the
holding company of Alibaba’s financial products. It operates in various
business areas including digital payments (Alipay), business finance (Ant
Micro Loan), marketplace lending (Ant Check Later), wealth management (Ant
Fortune), online banking (Mybank), and insurance and credit reference
(Sesame Credit).
Its dominance can be gauged from the fact that in February 2014, Alipay
announced for the first time that its mobile payments volume was greater
than both PayPal and Square combined.
Key factors behind Ant Financial’s success include diversified businesses,
robust government support, and a strong international presence.
65
Ant Financial operates on a larger
scale than most other players
Overview
Ant Financial is a holding company for eCommerce giant Alibaba’s financial products. It includes
multiple financial businesses operating in areas such as
▪ Digital payments: Alipay
▪ Personal finance:
− Marketplace lending: Ant Check Later
Alipay, its flagship payment product, is referred to as the PayPal of China but operates on a much
larger scale compared to its U.S. counterpart. In February 2014, Alipay announced for the first time
that its mobile payments volume was greater than the volume of both PayPal and Square combined.
Since then, the company has achieved a share of about 58% of third-party online payments in China
as per estimates by Credit Suisse and over 80% of third-party mobile payments as per Citigroup.
Ant Financial was said to be readying itself for an IPO in Hong Kong in 2018. This is seen as a big step
in the company’s evolution from an online payments provider into an online finance behemoth, even
though the IPO plans have been pushed back again.
Digital payments
▪ Annual active users: 870m1 ▪ Annual active users: 237m4
▪ Mobile payments users: 400m2 ▪ Mobile payments users: 210m2
Wealth management
▪ Annual active users: 330m3 ▪ Active users: 9.9m
Online banking
▪ Cumulated borrowers: 7m4 ▪ Cumulated borrowers: 4.5m
Insurance
▪ Cumulated users: 380m ▪ Cumulated users: 400m
Moreover, Alibaba’s wealth of historical data on merchants and on consumers gave its businesses
access to a large customer base at the time of their launch and has provided them with faster
customer conversion, moderation of credit risk, and a scalable online infrastructure. The company
grew to a valuation of US$150 billion after its latest funding round in May 2018.
Government investment:
Another reason driving Ant Financial's large-scale success is the involvement of state financial
institutions as investors. China Investment Corporation (CIC), the US$740 billion sovereign wealth
fund and the country’s national social security fund are now among the company’s biggest
shareholders, giving it access to a considerable amount of money to fund its aggressive expansion
plans. In May 2018, the company secured the world’s largest private fundraising round for an
internet company at US$10 billion, giving it a valuation of around US$150 billion.
67
Source: Bloomberg, CLSA Research
Ant Financial taps into the huge
offline payments market
Key success factors (2/2)
According to an HSBC report in 2015, the Chinese O2O market valued over US$150 billion in 2015,
with consumers expecting a seamless experience between physical stores, websites, and mobile
applications. With 400 million users, the e-wallet Alipay is now widely used in Chinese retail outlets,
drug stores, and restaurants. Users can link their bank accounts to the service and make purchases
in-store by having a cashier scan a QR code within the Alipay app.
In order to fuel international expansion, in 2016 the company announced its plans to partner with
one million offline merchants in China and overseas over the next 3 years to facilitate the use of
Alipay in other global markets. The company’s ambitious plans in this space put it against players
such as Apple Pay and Samsung Pay, both present in China, and the established domestic payment
network UnionPay.
International expansion:
International expansion is a new but important strategic goal for the current stage of Ant’s growth,
and the main focus is on Asia. Apart from acquiring a significant stake in Indian payments giant
Paytm, Ant Financial has also invested in Singapore-based security technology company V-Key and
partnered with Thai payment firm Ascend. It also has digital wallet licenses in countries such as
Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. In Europe, Alipay has partnered with the Swiss tax
refund company Global Blue, which allows Chinese tourists to credit value tax refunds on their
overseas purchases directly to their Alipay accounts.
68
Source: HSBC
Alipay excels PayPal in all metrics
Alipay vs. PayPal
Even though both Alipay and PayPal have achieved remarkable success, the scale of operations of
Alipay has helped the company offer an attractive value proposition to its users. The fact that Alipay
is building on the Alibaba ecosystem also gives it a much larger user base and scale when compared
to PayPal, which operates as a standalone company. Moreover, PayPal is still focused on its primary
business of payment processing while Alipay has diversified into other related areas as well.
PayPal scores over Alipay in terms of international acceptance and worldwide popularity. PayPal has
built a robust brand in the U.S., Europe and Asia over the years. On the other hand, Alipay has been
predominantly focused on the Chinese market, with international expansion coming into focus only
recently. For example, in Hong Kong, where over 30 retail chains accept Alipay payments, only users
with linked Mainland Chinese bank accounts can use Alipay wallets for their purchases.
1,7001
Payment
volume in
billion US$ 4562
8703
Active users in 2374
millions
400
Mobile
payments 210
users5
1: Data as at 2016 2: As at Dec 2017 3: As at Jun 2018 4: As at March 31, 2018 5: As at August 69
2017
Source: Company information, Press releases
Consumer insights
When paying online, designated online payment methods (e.g. PayPal,
Amazon Payments) are highest in use in Germany, the UK, and China as
compared to other forms of payments such as credit/debit cards, prepaid
cards and direct debit. However, credit cards were used by most U.S.
Americans for making payments online. PayPal dominates the German, UK
and U.S. markets, whereas Unionpay and Alipay have highest usage in China.
Cash still dominates financial transactions at the POS in the U.S. and
Germany, but in China, mobile payments have already taken the lead. The
most widely used mobile payment provider in China is WeChat Pay, whereas
Apple Pay leads in the UK and the U.S., and Payback Pay tops the chart in
Germany.
70
Online payment and direct debit are
mostly used for online payments
Online payment (1/2)
A Statista survey on online & mobile payments in 2018, part of the Statista Global Consumer Survey,
examines the behavior of the residential online population in 28 countries who used online or
mobile payments at least once in the last 12 months. For this report we focus on the U.S., the UK,
Germany, and China.
It covers the following topics: online payment methods used, mobile payments, P2P payments, the
purpose of use, and brands.
More exciting results of this survey can be found in the Statista Global Consumer Survey.
Online payment
100
80
Cash on delivery Invoice
60
40
20
“How have you conducted online payments in the past 12 months?”; Multi Pick; U.S.: n=4,099, UK: n=2,031, Germany: n=2,077,
China: n=2,075
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at: Nov 2017 to Jun 2018
Online payment methods (e.g. PayPal, Amazon Payments) have the highest use in Germany, the UK,
and China compared to any other form of payments such as credit/debit cards, prepaid cards, and
direct debit. Credit cards were used by most U.S. American respondents for making payments online
in the 12 months prior to the survey.
Payment by invoice is only prevalent in Germany as an online payment method in the group of these
four countries.
71
Germany sports the highest online
payment usage with 77%
Online payment (2/2)
When it comes to the use of online payment through companies such as Paypal, Amazon Pay, Google
Wallet, Masterpass, etc., German online consumers lead the way with a usage rate of 77%. The
Statista Global Consumer Survey, which compares 28 countries based on interviews among more
than 120,000 consumers, shows that the UK and Poland follow with 71.5% and 71%, respectively.
The U.S., which is usually the leader in new business models, is placed at a lowly 14th rank with a 58%
usage. Generally, the field is dominated by European countries and India.
Germany 77.0%
UK 71.5%
Poland 71.0%
India 68.9%
Australia 67.0%
Italy 64.1%
Mexico 63.8%
Netherlands 63.5%
South Africa 62.5%
Finland 60.8%
Spain 58.9%
Russia 58.7%
France 58.5%
U.S. 58.0%
Austria 57.6%
China 51.0%
“How have you conducted online payments in the past 12 months?”; Multi Pick; Statement: “online payments (e.g. PayPal,
Amazon Pay)”; n=26,775
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at: Nov 2017 to Jun 2018
Looking at user demographics, there are quite a few differences depending on the country. In India,
for example, online payment methods users are middle-aged and live in middle to high-income
households. More men than women use online payment methods in India. In the U.S., the age profile
of online payment methods users are young adults.
72
1: Online payments such as Paypal, Amazon Pay, Google Wallet, Masterpass etc
The most widely used online
payment brand is PayPal
Online payment: brands
PayPal is the most favored brand in terms of online payment in the eyes of the surveyed population
in the U.S., the UK, and Germany with 90–96% of respondents using the service, followed by Amazon
Pay (16–32%). While Amazon Pay makes the top 2 in the U.S. and the UK, Sofortüberweisung,
nowadays renamed to klarna, is a bit stronger in Germany.
However, China has a completely different story, with Unionpay, Alipay and Wechat Pay taking the
first three spots in the chart with 42%, 40% and 39% usage, respectively.
“Which online payment services have you used in the past 12 months?”; Multi Pick; U.S.: n=2,376, UK: n=1,452, Germany:
n=1,1599, China: n=1,059; Residential online population, conducted online payments in the past 12 months
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at: Nov 2017 to Jun 2018
▪ U.S.: Masterpass (9%), Neteller (8%), Skrill (6%), 2Checkout (5%), other (6%)
▪ UK: Skrill (3%), Neteller (2%), 2Checkout (1%), Trustly (1%), Boon. (1%)
▪ Germany: Billpay (4%), Skrill (3%), Masterpass (2%), Neteller (1%), Trustly (1%)
▪ China: 99Bill (12%), 1qianbao (12%), Lianlian Pay (11%), UMF (7%), Ips (4%)
73
China leads the use of mobile
payments at POS
Mobile payments at POS (1/2)
While mobile payments are already very popular in China with nearly 70% of respondents using
them, they are still rarely used in the U.S., the UK, and Germany. The second most prominent
payment method at the POS in China is cash.
A lot of people in the U.S., the UK, and Germany still use cash to pay at the POS. Credit/debit cards
are also widely used, whereas prepaid cards / vouchers and checks are used by few.
Cash
100
80
60
Check Debit card
40
20
0
Credit card
“How have you paid in stores, restaurants and other points of sale in the past 12 months?”; Multi Pick; U.S.: n=4,099, UK:
n=2,031, Germany: n=2,077, China: n=2,075
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at: Nov 2017 to Jun 2018
When comparing countries, it becomes obvious that mobile payments at the POS are mostly used in
emerging countries, with China (69%), India (54%) and Nigeria (51%) leading the ranking.
All western countries are far behind in terms of usage. The U.S., which is usually the leader in new
business models, comes 7th with a usage of 20%. Generally, the field is dominated by Asian countries.
74
PoS: The point of sale (POS) or point of purchase (POP) is the time and place where a retail
transaction is completed
China leads in terms of mobile
payments at POS with 69% usage
Mobile payments at POS (2/2)
China 69%
India 54%
Nigeria 51%
Indonesia 23%
South Korea 21%
Russia 20%
U.S. 20%
South Africa 20%
Sweden 19%
Poland 17%
Brazil 15%
Colombia 15%
Turkey 14%
UK 14%
Mexico 13%
Spain 12%
Australia 12%
Canada 10%
Finland 10%
Netherlands 9%
Argentina 8%
Italy 7%
Morocco 7%
Japan 6%
Germany 4%
France 4%
Austria 3%
ApplePay is the most frequently used brand in the mobile payments (via smartphone) business in the
U.S. and the UK with 51–56% of respondents using the service, followed by Android Pay (41–44%). In
Germany, Payback and Masterpass are the most popular mobile payment methods with 77% and
33% usage, respectively.
However, China, the global leader in mobile payments (via smartphone) at POS, has a completely
different story, with WeChat Pay, UnionPay and Alipay taking the first three spots in the chart with
36%, 31% and 31% usage, respectively. ApplePay, the leader in the U.S. and in the UK, managed to
get 5th position with 17% usage.
“Which of these services have you used in the past 12 months to pay in stores, restaurants or other points of sale with your
smartphone?”; Multi Pick; U.S.: n=818, UK: n=277, Germany: n=83, China: n=1,440; Residential population, conducted mobile
payments at POS in the past 12 months
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at: Nov 2017 to Jun 2018
▪ UK: Microsoft Wallet (11%), Bitpay (5%), Chase Pay (4%), Boon. (3%), other (4%)
76
28% of U.S. onliners would like to
use mobile payments at all times
Mobile payments at POS: U.S.
Minor purchases
14%
(e.g. decoration items)
Major purchases
8%
(e.g. washing machine)
1: Question: “In what situations would you like to be able to pay with your smartphone (without 77
debit/credit card or cash)?”; basis: all respondents, n=4,099
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey : United States, as at: April/May 2018
In the UK, only 17% want to use
mobile payments at all times
Mobile payments at POS: UK
Situations in which people from the UK would like to use mobile payment1
Minor purchases
13%
(e.g. decoration items)
Travel booking 7%
Major purchases
4%
(e.g. washing machine)
1: Question: “In what situations would you like to be able to pay with your smartphone (without 78
debit/credit card or cash)?”; basis: all respondents, n=2,031
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey : United Kingdom, as at: Nov to Dec 2017
Mobile payments used mainly for
public transportation in Germany
Mobile payments at POS: Germany
Minor purchases
11%
(e.g. decoration items)
Travel booking 5%
Major purchases
4%
(e.g. washing machine)
1: Question: “In what situations would you like to be able to pay with your smartphone (without 79
debit/credit card or cash)?”; basis: all respondents, n=2,077
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey: Germany, as at: Nov to Dec 2017
57% of Chinese onliners want to
use mobile payments at all times
Mobile payments at POS: China
Minor purchases
18%
(e.g. decoration items)
Major purchases
12%
(e.g. washing machine)
1: Question: “In what situations would you like to be able to pay with your smartphone (without 80
debit/credit card or cash)?”; basis: all respondents, n=2,075
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey: China, as at: June 2018
China leads in the usage of bank
transfer services
P2P payments: consumer insights (1/2)
Direct bank transfer still leads as the most widely used P2P money transfer tool in the UK, Germany,
and China. The U.S. is the only country where direct money transfer services (e.g. PayPal) are more
frequently used, namely by 45% of respondents.
When it comes to the use of a direct money transfer service such as PayPal, the Swedish onliners
lead the way with a usage rate of 51%, followed by the U.S., Mexico, and India with 45%, 41%, and
41%, respectively. China, which leads in mobile payments at POS, comes in 4th place with 42% of
respondents having used direct money transfer services in the 12 months prior to the survey.
41
61
Bank transfer
47
75
Using a direct 45
money 33
transfer service 26
(e.g. PayPal)
42
36
26
Not at all
40
10
“How have you transferred money to friends and acquaintances in the past 12 months?”; Multi Pick; U.S.: n=4,099, UK:
n=2,031, Germany: n=2,077, China: n=2,075
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at May 2018
Noticeably, two developing economies, Mexico and India, are ahead of developed countries from
Europe and Canada in terms of direct money transfers. The growth in the Indian P2P payment
market is further corroborated by the data from AgileIntel Research, which estimates the Indian P2P
payments market to grow at a CAGR of over 72% from 2017 to 2022.
81
Sweden leads the chart in using
direct money transfer services
P2P payments: consumer insights (2/2)
Share of respondents who used direct money transfer in the last 12 months
Sweden 51%
U.S. 45%
Mexico 44%
India 44%
China 42%
Russia 39%
Italy 36%
South Africa 34%
UK 33%
Spain 33%
Colombia 33%
Brazil 32%
Australia 31%
Canada 29%
Indonesia 29%
Germany 26%
Poland 26%
Argentina 26%
Morocco 25%
France 24%
Nigeria 24%
Finland 21%
Netherlands 16%
South Korea 16%
Turkey 15%
Austria 9%
Japan 3%
“How have you transferred money to friends and acquaintances in the past 12 months?”; Multi 82
Pick; Statement: “using a direct money transfer service (e.g. PayPal)”; n=22,630
Source: Statista Global Consumer Survey, as at: Nov 2017 to Jun 2018
Statista Global Consumer Survey:
online & mobile payments 2018
About the study
This Statista survey among internet users aged 18 years or older on online & mobile payments in
2018 is part of the Statista Global Consumer Survey and focuses on the residential online population
in 28 countries who used online or mobile payments at least once in the last 12 months. In this
report, we focus on the U.S., the UK, Germany, and China. The survey covers the following topics:
online payment methods used, mobile payments, P2P payments, purpose of use, and brands.
The Statista Global Consumer Survey compares 28 countries based on interviews among more than
120,000 consumers on more than 50 industries and topics and over 1,400 brands. Thus, it offers a
global perspective on consumption and media usage, covering the offline and online world of the
consumer. It is designed to help marketers, planners and product managers understand consumer
behavior and consumer interactions with brands. It is an intuitive expert tool to investigate and gain
insight into consumer behavior, drawn from an exclusive, global survey.
The Statista Consumer and Business Insights team carries out quantitative online and telephone
surveys among consumers and industry experts around the world, with a focus on Germany, the
U.S., and the United Kingdom. We comply with the guidelines set out by the professional associations
ESOMAR, BVM, ADM, and DGOF to, in particular, maintain scientific standards pertaining to the
collection, analysis, and protection of data as well as the processing of personal information.
83
Competitive landscape
The U.S. leads in the number of FinTech companies globally. Specifically, most
of the prominent U.S. FinTech companies are located in California and New
York. We have a closer look at some of those prominent U.S. FinTech start-ups:
Venmo, Stripe, Ondeck, Lending Club, Prosper, SoFi, Betterment, and
Wealthfront.
Although they offer services in the same segments, their specific conditions
and features vary a lot. For example, in the marketplace lending segment, SoFi
offers personal loans with variable interest rates whereas LendingClub and
Prosper provide loans with fixed rates.
84
Prominent U.S. FinTech companies
located in California and New York
Overview of selected U.S. FinTech companies
Alaska Hawaii
1: Transaction value 2: Financial year 2017 3: Data from company website as at June 2018 4: As
at March 31, 2018 5: Company information as at June 2018 6: Assets under management 7: As 85
at January 2018
Source: Company information
OnDeck and Lending Club business
loans vary in all specifics
Comparison: Alternative Lending – Crowdlending
Term loans
Annual interest rate From 9.99%, excl. fees 6.16%–35.89%, incl. fees
Lines of credit
86
Note: All data are based on company information as at June 2018
1: Waived with initial draw of US$5,000
Only SoFi offers personal loans with
variable interest rates
Comparison: Alternative Lending – Marketplace Lending
1
KPIs Betterment Wealthfront SoFi
Account balance
▪ Basic account: 0.25% 0% 0%
<US$10k
▪ Account incl. one
expert call: 0.40%2
▪ Account incl. unlimited
Account balance
expert calls: 0.50%2 0.25% 0.25%
>US$10k
Venmo is a mobile person-to-person payment service that allows users to transfer money and send
payments to other users. Users link their debit and credit cards online and can transfer money to all
recipients.
The company was founded in 2009 by Andrew Kortina and Iqram Magdon-Ismail and is
headquartered in New York. After 3 years, the app was launched in 2012 and acquired by Braintree
in the same year. PayPal acquired Venmo through its US$800 million acquisition of payments
processing start-up Braintree in 2013.
Until now the service is available in the U.S. only and PayPal is providing all money transmissions.
Funding sources for payments are the balance on the Venmo account, credit/debit cards, or a U.S.
bank account. Payments to businesses can only be made if they include Venmo as a payment option
in their own check-out, a transfer of money via the Venmo app is not possible.
Venmo's revenues come from charging merchants for the use of Venmo in their check-out and by
charging for the use of credit cards.
Fee structure5:
Fees within Venmo app:
▪ Fee for the user: a standard US$0.25 for each instant transfer
1: As stated in Forbes at Feb 2017 2: As at June 2017 3: Transaction value 4: As at July 2016 5:
Company information as at June 2017 6: In case a merchant has included Venmo as a payment 89
option in their check-out
Source: Company information, Forbes, Crunchbase, PayPal, Business Insider
Venmo offers users payment
services with a social element
Venmo: business overview (2/2)
USP:
Besides fund transfer services, Venmo also advertises the possibility to connect with people. As the
peer-to-peer economy started to grow, Venmo seized the opportunity to position the platform as a
social network.
Unlike to other mobile payment services, Venmo offers to keep transactions public to the user’s
network of friends. With the option to add details to the transaction, it resembles a social network.
Since paying via Venmo is free – as long as users don‘t choose credit cards as a payment method – it
is a widely used service.
90
Source: Company information
In 2016, Venmo didn’t reach goal of
US$20bn in processed volume
Venmo: timeline (1/2)
2009
Founded by Andrew Kortina and Iqram Magdon-Ismail
91
Source: Company information
Venmo launched its own physical
debit card in 2017
Venmo: timeline (2/2)
2017 May: Opening for its beta for select U.S. PayPal merchants announced
to accept Venmo as a mobile payment option
June: Testing of an own physical debit card linked to the Venmo
account to allow users to make purchases in brick-and-mortar stores
92
Source: Company information
Stripe is an interface between
merchants and payment providers
Stripe: business overview
Stripe is a B2B payment provider that offers payment solutions for businesses to accept payments
online and via mobile apps. It lets merchants process credit card payments directly from their own
websites, simply by inserting a few lines of code. Stripe’s clients include Twitter, Kickstarter, Shopify,
Salesforce, and Lyft. Additionally to payment services, Stripe offers:
▪ Payments services for platforms to receive money from customers and transfer it to the respective
third parties
USP:
Stripe simplifies payment-related transactions by providing technical and banking infrastructure.
They offer a lot of payment methods, like credit/debit cards, bank accounts, wallets, or digital
currencies. Stripe's biggest advantage is Stripe.js, a feature that enables the direct, encrypted
transfer of credit card data to Stripe without being saved or transferred to the merchant server.
Additionally, Stripe offers the possibility to handle subscription payments. In addition to an easy
incorporation of the Stripe code by developers, users of Wordpress or Magento can use open-source
plug-ins to incorporate Stripe.
Stripe also offers a free data portability, in case the client decides to switch to another payment
processor, reducing the fear of being permanently locked-in with Stripe.
Fee structure1:
▪ 2.9% of transaction value plus US$0.30 per successful transaction for domestic credit and debit
cards
▪ An additional 1% for international cards and another 1% conversion fee if charge currency differs
from payout currency
▪ 0.8% of transaction value for ACH3 and Bitcoin transactions, max. US$5
93
Source: Company information, Crunchbase, Wall Street Journal
Stripe went from company
foundation to launch in 2 years
Stripe: timeline (1/2)
94
Source: Company information
Business expansion to various
European countries in 2017
Stripe: timeline (2/2)
95
Source: Company information
OnDeck provided over US$6bn in
loans to global customers
OnDeck: business overview
OnDeck provides a platform for small business lending. The company uses its proprietary technology
and analytics to analyze data points from various sources to assess the creditworthiness of small
businesses. It follows a direct lending business model.
To date, the company has deployed over US$6 billion to more than 50,000 customers in 700
different industries across the U.S., Canada, and Australia.
USP:
OnDeck offers term loans up to US$500,000 with a term of 3–36 months and lines of credit up to
US$100,000. OnDeck decides on loan eligibility based on data about business operations of a
company, which are processed by an algorithm. These algorithms replace loan officers and enable
entrepreneurs to get their money after a shorter waiting time. The decision is made by the algorithm
in minutes, and an approved loan will be payed out within 24 hours to two working days. OnDeck
requires the business to have a minimum revenue of US$100,000 and to operate for at least a year
before the loan application.
Fee structure1:
Origination fee for term loans per business:
▪ First loan: 2.5–4%
▪ Term loans: starts from 9%, with average rates of 47.3% AIR2
1: Company information as at June 2018 2: Annual interest rate – in annualized terms, excluding 96
fees 3: Annual percentage rate – in annualized terms, including fees
Source: Company information
In 2014, OnDeck was listed on NYSE
– only 7 years after its foundation
OnDeck: timeline (1/2)
97
Source: Company information
In 2017, OnDeck formed several
strategic partnerships
OnDeck: timeline (2/2)
98
1: WEX is a corporate and small business payment solutions provider
Source: Company information
Lending Club originated almost
US$34 billion in loans
Lending Club: business overview (1/4)
Lending Club is an online credit marketplace connecting borrowers and investors. It offers a
proprietary technology platform that automates various aspects of operations starting from data
gathering, a borrower application process, credit approval and scoring to loan funding, investing, and
fraud detection. All loans are made by WebBank, similar to Prosper.
Lending Club offers term loans up to US$500,000 with a term of 3–36 months.
Personal loan terms are fixed to 3 or 5 years similar to Prosper, but Lending Club has more personal
loan categories:
▪ Credit card refinancing
▪ Debt consolidation
▪ Home improvement
▪ Car financing (repairs or purchases)
▪ Major purchase
▪ Home buying
▪ Green loan
▪ Business
▪ Vacation
▪ Moving and relocation
▪ Medical expenses
▪ other
All loans have fixed fees apart from the business lines of credit and a special form of patient financing
loans.
99
1: Each draw needs to be payed back within 25 months 2: December 31, 2017 3: As at Q4 2017
Source: Company information
Fees depend on type of product
and borrower rating
Lending Club: business overview (2/4)
Businesses need to be in business for two years with a minimum revenue of US$75,000 to qualify for
business loans or lines of credit.
Private investors can invest in personal loans. Institutional investors can additionally invest in patient
financing and business loans.
The minimum investment per loan is US$25, but investors have to transfer US$1,000 to Lending Club
to open an account. Investors see rate, risk rating, term, FICO score1, loan amount, loan category,
current funding percentage, as well as amount and time left.
Investors can choose to open a retirement account or an investment account. Investor notes on
loans can be traded on a note trading platform.
As loans are payed back on a monthly basis, investors receive a monthly cash flow of 2–5%. Lending
Club advertises that 98% of their portfolios with more than 100 investments in different loans of
similar size realize positive returns.
Fee structure5:
Borrowers (personal loans):
▪ Origination fee: 1–6%, the average for Grade A loans is 3.46% as at Q1 20172
▪ APR :
3,4 6.16%–35.89% depending on the borrower rating
Borrowers (auto-refinancing):
▪ Origination fee: 0%
▪ APR3: 2.24%–19.99% depending on the borrower rating
Borrowers (patient financing):
▪ APR3: 3.99%–24.99% depending on the borrower rating. Additionally no-
interest plan offered with 0% APR3 for determined period and
23.73% variable APR3 after that
Investors:
▪ Service fee: 1% of payment amount received within 15 days of due date
▪ Collection fee: Up to 30% on the amount of any payments successfully
collected on pre- and post-charged off loans
1: Credit score created by the Fair Isaac Corporation 2: Company information as at June 2018 3:
Annual percentage rate 4: includes origination fee 5: Does not apply if fee is payed early 6: 100
Lending Club will charge the higher amount
Source: Company information
Lending Club offers returns
between 5% and 8%
Lending Club: business overview (3/4)
Lending Club currently advertises average returns for investors from 5.11% to 7.89%1. Lending Club
uses a rating scale for loans from A (low risk) to G (high risk) with according estimated returns, incl. an
adjustment for estimated future losses1.
7.89% 7.68%
6.96% 7.02%
5.11%
2.66%
A B C D E F+G
Average interest rates from Q1 2017 are 10.91% for 3-year loans and 14.90% for 5-year loans, which
means 12.55% on average for all loans2.
Refinancing & credit card payments Major purchase, car financing, Other
vacation & medical expenses
Home buying, improvements & moving Business
1,37%
61.45% 7.48% 23.40%
6.30%
1: Based on Adjusted Net Annualized Return ("Adjusted NAR") of all loans issued 15 months or
more March 31, 2018, company information as at June 2018 2: All loans combining 3 and 5-year 101
loans 3: As at March 31, 2018 for Q1 2018
Source: Company information
Automated investment strategies
are based on risk preference
Lending Club: business overview (4/4)
USP:
Similar to other lending marketplaces, Lending Club performs at a lower internal cost than traditional
lending institutions and provides advantages for all counterparts: the possibility to receive a loan for
borrowers that usually do not get one and solid returns to investors.
Borrowers get answers on their potential rates in minutes without an impact on their credit score.
Interest rates are fixed and thus borrowers have a fixed monthly fee to pay. More than 60% of
borrowers therefore use Lending Club loans to refinance their debt or pay off their credit card debt,
which usually has very high interest rates.
Lending Club also makes it very easy for investors to dip into the personal loans market. Loans are
divided into US$25 notes that are sold to investors. Lending Club publishes detailed information
about the loans on the daily basis. It also provides vast anonymized information about prospective
borrowers.
In the Lending Club app investors can see their account value, returns and their holdings. The status
of their holdings is also displayed, giving investors a chance to quickly get an overview of how much
of their invested money is currently at high risk, i.e. where payment is delayed or a note defaulted.
An additional feature is the possibility to invest via the app. Here investors have two options:
▪ Manual selection: Investors can see all potential loans with all relevant information and can sort
and filter the selection. Investments are done by clicking on the “+“ button and then proceeding to
the check-out.
▪ Automated investments: Depending on the chosen strategy, an algorithm will automatically invest
in loans. The strategies are completely based on different borrower ratings. Investors can choose
to weigh low-risk ratings (A+B) or high-risk ratings (D to G) or invest in the current platform mix.
Projected returns for the different strategies are shown as well. Investors can also customize their
strategy with their own grade mix.
102
Source: Company information
Lending Club exceeded US$3bn in
personal loans in 2013
Lending Club: timeline (1/3)
March: Entered into the business lending with the launch of a new
2014 platform
April: Acquired Springstone Financial, a provider of education and
patient financing
May: Partnered with Union Bank to enable it to purchase personal
loans through the Lending Club platform
103
Source: Company information
In 2014, Lending Clubs IPO1 raised
over US$1 billion
Lending Club: timeline (2/3)
104
Source: Company information
Loan originations declined in the
first quarter of 2017
Lending Club: timeline (3/3)
June: Appointed Scott Sanborn as CEO and President and Hans Morris
2016
as Chairman of the Board of Directors
October: Announced the launch of an auto refinance product which
helps consumers save money
November: Secured a US$1.3 billion purchase program from Credigy,
a subsidiary of National Bank of Canada
March: While the 2016 annual report showed a slow but steady
2017 recovery, loan originations declined again in the first Quarter of 2017
October: Shut down five of its investment funds with a total value of
US$376 million
105
Source: Company information
Prosper funded over US$9 billion
small business loans
Prosper: business overview (1/2)
The company also launched the Prosper Daily app in March 2016 to provide budgeting and spending
tracking services, alerts for potential fraudulent charges, and credit monitoring. The Prosper
marketplace lending platform is owned by Prosper Funding LLC, which is a subsidiary of Prosper
Marketplace. Prosper loans are made by WebBank.
▪ Launch: 2005
▪ Number of Employees (2017): 3771
Fee structure1:
Borrowers:
1: As of December 31, 2017 2: Company information as at June 2018 3: Includes late fees, post
charge-off principal recovery, servicing fees, interest on charge-offs and estimated principal loss 106
on charge-offs from such loans, based on data from May 1 to May 31, 2018 Source: Company
information
Next to loans, Prosper offers
identity theft protection
Prosper: business overview (2/2)
USP:
Borrowers get low, fixed-rate loans and can check their potential interest rates in minutes without
any impact on their credit score. Investors can consider borrowers’ credit scores, rating, histories,
loan amount, yield, the category of the loan, as well as the current funding status of the loan and the
time left.
▪ Debt consolidation
▪ Home improvement
▪ Small business
▪ Special occasion
Prosper administrates the transactions with handling the servicing of the loan, collecting and
distributing the borrowers payment. Signing up to Prosper is uncomplicated and the service
guarantees no hidden fees or penalties. The funds can be transferred directly to the borrowers
account for no additional fee. The company does not only position its services as a quick and modern
lending solution, but also emphasize that they create an opportunity to invest in each other in a way
that is financially and socially rewarding.
A new Prosper product is “Prosper Daily” that offers the possibility to synch all financial accounts to
Prosper and is free of charge.
107
Source: Company information
Surpassing US$2 billion in personal
loans in 8 years
Prosper: timeline (1/2)
2008 October: Stopped all lending on its site because of scrutiny by the SEC
January: Raised US$20 million from Sequoia Capital and other existing
2013 investors
September: Raised US$25 million in a funding round led by existing
partner Sequoia Capital and new investor BlackRock
108
Source: Company information
Institutional investors will invest up
to US$5bn in next 24 months
Prosper: timeline (2/2)
May: Laid off 171 people and shut down its Salt Lake City office
October: Announced the launch of new app feature called Credit Card
Optimizer to provide consumers with additional financial information
February: Signed a deal with institutional investors to purchase up to
2017 US$5 billion worth of loans through the Prosper platform
May: Announced the closing of the first securitization from the
Prosper Marketplace Issuance Trust worth US$495 million
September: Raised US$50 million in a Series G round from an
investment fund co-managed by FinEX Asia
109
Source: Company information
SoFi funded US$19 billion in loans
and has US$3 million AUM1
SoFi: business overview (1/3)
SoFi is a U.S.-based provider of lending and wealth management (Social Finance Inc.). It also offers
term life insurance in partnership with Protective Life. Founded in 2011 by Mike Cagney, Dan Macklin,
James Finnigan, and Ian Brady, the company is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
The company’s borrowing products include
▪ Personal loans
▪ Parent loans
Service offerings:
Wealth manager Social Finance offers portfolio management, private placement – opportunity to
invest in SoFi loans for high net worth investors, asset allocation, risk-evaluation, consulting,
investment banking, and financial advisory services.
All SoFi loans are originated by SoFi Lending Corp or SoFi Mortgage LLC, depending on the loan
product and state.
Borrowers can get a personal loan of US$5,000 to US$100,000 with fixed interest rates for a term of
3, 5, or 7 years. Student loan refinancing works for a term of 5, 7, 10, 15 or 20 years and are available
with a fixed or variable interest rate. Parent loans have a fixed interest rate and a 5- or 10-year term.
Similar to other of SoFi’s refinancing products, the Parent refinancing loan has the option for a fixed
or a variable rate and a term of 5, 7, 10, or 15 years. Mortgages work with a minimum down payment
of 10% and have a maximum value of US$3 million.
1: Assets under management 2: Feb 2018 3: As of June 2018 4: Company information as at Feb 110
2018
Source: Company information, Crowdfund Insider, Forbes, Crunchbase, Bloomberg
SoFi offers fixed & variable rates –
wealth mgmt. is free for members
SoFi: business overview (2/3)
Fee structure1:
Personal loan (fees incl. a discount of 0.25% for automatic payment 2):
▪ Origination fee: 0%
Student loan (fees incl. a discount of 0.25% for automatic payment 2):
▪ Variable rate3: 2.615%–6.540% depending on term and borrower rating and the 1-month
LIBOR4 (therefore these ranges may vary monthly).
Parent loan (fees incl. a discount of 0.25% for automatic payment 2):
▪ Origination fee: 0%
Parent refinancing loans (fees incl. a discount of 0.25% for automatic payment 2):
▪ Variable rate3: 2.615%–6.290% depending on term and borrower rating and the 1-month
LIBOR4 (therefore these ranges may vary monthly).
▪ Origination fees: 0%
▪ Interest rates: Vary depending on loan term, rating, and down payment
Wealth management:
1: Company information as at June 2017 2: Discount does not apply for every non-automated
payment, increasing the APR 3: Rates as at June 1, 2017 4: London Interbank Offered Rate 5: Or 111
a monthly automated transfer of US$100
Source: Company information
SoFi is a social community with
several benefits for its members
SoFi: business overview (3/3)
USP:
SoFi positions itself as a social community – as social finance. Next to their lending and wealth
management business, they offer community events, e.g. dinners, happy hours, panel sessions,
networking opportunities, etc. to connect “members” – as they call their customers – to each other.
Furthermore, customers that already have a loan receive a rate discount on additional SoFi loans and
do not pay for SoFi wealth management.
Additionally, SoFi offers their members the following:
▪ Career advisory for career transitions, job search, personal branding, incl. personal meetings with
the advisors
▪ Unemployment protection – a program borrowers can apply to in case they lose their job through
no fault of their own. After successful application, loan payments will be suspended for three
months and can be extended up to 12 months.
▪ Entrepreneur program to support the launch of an own company with mentorship and resources,
access to investors, and a peer network. Additionally, SoFi offers to defer student loans for 6
months to use the free resources to grow a new business.
SoFi actively promotes referrals as customers receive up to US$300 for each new customer they
referred, with the new customer receiving up to US$100.
SoFi wealth management offers low fees and is free for SoFi
borrowers. In contrast to other FinTech wealth management
companies, SoFi offers a more individual wealth management
approach with personalized advice. But similar to other FinTech
players, the portfolio is based on ETF funds that are actively
curated by SoFi’s finance specialists. According to SoFi, their
advisors do not receive commissions and support SoFi
customers in planning and reaching their financial goals. SoFi
portfolios are automatically rebalanced.
In the SoFi Wealth app, users can see their risk preference, the
respective allocation, and the single investments classified by
asset class.
112
Source: Company information
SoFi received >US$155 million
funding in first 3 years
SoFi: timeline (1/3)
113
Source: Company information
SoFi improved account protection
with two-step verification in 2017
SoFi: timeline (2/3)
114
Source: Company information
SoFi expands its business through
partnership in 2018
SoFi: timeline (3/3)
115
Source: Company information
Wealthfront sets an account
minimum of US$500
Wealthfront: business overview (1/2)
Wealthfront is an online automated investment service that provides data-driven and customized
solutions. Even though it primarily caters to individuals, it also services charitable organizations and
corporations. Founded by Dan Carroll and Andy Rachleff in 2008, the company is headquartered in
Palo Alto, California and was formerly known as kaChing Group. The platform launched 3 years later
in 2011.
Wealthfront offers investing strategies based on modern portfolio theory and invests in public equity
and fixed income markets globally, as well as in mutual funds and exchange traded funds. To do this,
Wealthfront invests in ETFs that track the indexes for the chosen asset classes in their portfolio.
Service offerings:
▪ Individual accounts
▪ Joint accounts
▪ Trust accounts
▪ Traditional IRAs3
▪ 401(k) rollovers
▪ Roth IRAs4
▪ SEP IRAs5
▪ Inflation-protected bonds
Fee Structure1:
▪ Account balance up to US$10,000: Free, US$500 minimum balance
USP:
Wealthfront is especially attractive for small private investors with US$10,000 or less to invest
because they don't charge fees in that case, although they require a minimum investment of
US$500. Also, Wealthfront builds on personal recommendations, as referrals of friends are
incentivized by an additional US$5,000 capital that is managed for free.
Wealthfront generates up to 2% of annual tax saving through dividend-based rebalancing, daily tax-
loss harvesting, and direct indexing. Direct indexing is available for accounts with a minimum
investment of US$100,000.
In order to offer customized financial advice, Wealthfront established “Path“. Customers have to
answer some questions and link their financial accounts to Wealthfront to get an individual overview
on their financial situation. “Path” shows how much can be spent in retirement each month, based
on current savings and spending. Additionally, it shows the possible changes with a different saving
amount and offers advice in which account to allocate how much of the savings.
117
1: Company information as at June 2018
Source: Company information, Credio
Wealthfront launched new products
or features every year
Wealthfront: timeline (1/2)
118
1: Assets under management
Source: Company information
Wealthfront launched college
savings as new product line
Wealthfront: timeline (1/2)
April: Cut its expense ratio by half for its Risk Parity Fund to 0.25%
119
Source: Company information
List of U.S. FinTech Startups
SoFi, based out of California, is the most well-funded fintech company, with
over US$2bn raised since 2011. The company is backed by key investors such
as SoftBank, Silver Lake Partners, Peter Thiel and others and was last valued
at US$4.5bn in Q1 2017.
Avant and Kabbage are two other key FinTech start-ups that managed to get
more than US$1.5bn in funding.
120
Many FinTech start-ups cluster in
New York and California
Overview (1/2)
Alaska Hawaii
Company Headquarter
Addepar Mountain View, California
Affirm San Francisco, California
Avant Chicago, Illinois
Betterment New York City, New York
Bizfi New York City, New York
BlueVine Redwood City, California
Classy San Diego, California
Coinbase San Francisco, California
CommonBond New York City, New York
ConsenSys New York City, New York
Credible San Francisco, California
Credit Karma San Francisco, California
Digital Asset Holdings New York City, New York
121
Source: Company information
San Francisco is the location of
many Californian start-ups
Overview (2/2)
Company Headquarter
Earnest San Francisco, California
Equidate San Francisco, California
Finova Financial Palm Beach Gardens, Florida
Flint Redwood City, California
FutureAdvisor San Francisco, California
itBit New York City, New York
JH Capital Group Woodland Hills, California
Kabbage Atlanta, Georgia
Kensho Cambridge, Massachusetts
Lending Club San Francisco, California
Lending Home San Francisco, California
LendUp San Francisco, California
Lenny Credit Santa Monica, California
Motif Investing San Mateo, California
NerdWallet San Francisco, California
New Credit America Portland, Oregon
OnDeck New York City, New York
Pave New York City, New York
Payoneer New York City, New York
PaySimple Denver, Colorado
Plaid San Francisco, California
PledgeCap New York City, New York
Point Palo Alto, California
Prosper San Francisco, California
Ripple San Francisco, California
Robinhood Palo Alto, California
SoFi San Francisco, California
Square San Francisco, California
Stripe San Francisco, California
Tipalti San Mateo, California
TrueAccord San Francisco, California
Upstart San Carlos, California
Venmo New York City, New York
Wealthfront Palo Alto, California
WePay Redwood City, California
Zibby New York City, New York
122
Source: Company information
Coverage of FinTech areas by U.S.
start-ups (1/2)
Coverage (1/2)
123
Source: Company information
Coverage of FinTech areas by U.S.
start-ups (2/2)
Coverage (1/2)
1: While SoFi promotes that they do not use a robot, their wealth management offering largely 124
resembles that of Robo-Advisors
Source: Company information
FinTech companies covering other
areas
125
Source: Company information
SoFi is the U.S. FinTech start-up with
the highest funding so far
Funding & key investors (1/6)
Funding in
# Company million US$ Key investors
Baseline Ventures, DCM Ventures, Discovery Capital,
East West Bank, Innovation Endeavors, Institutional
1 2,000 Venture Partners, Jeff Seibert, Lakestar, Marco Rossi,
Morgan Stanley, Peter Thiel, QED Investors, Renren
Inc., Ron Suber, SGVC
August Capital, Balyasny Asset Management, DFJ
Growth, General Atlantic, Hyde Park Venture
2 1,800 Partners, Jefferies, JP Morgan Chase, KKR, Origin
Ventures, QED Investors, RRE Ventures, Tiger Global
Management, Victory Park Capital, and individuals
BlueRun Ventures, Guggenheim Securities, ING
Group, Lumia Capital, Mohr Davidow Ventures,
Recruit Strategic Partners, Reverence Capital
1,600 Partners, Santander InnoVentures, Scotiabank,
3
SoftBank Capital, SV Angel, The TCW Group,
Thomvest Ventures, UPS Strategic Enterprise Fund,
Victory Park Capital, Western Technology Investment,
Yuan Capital, and individuals
CapitalG, Felicis Ventures, FF Angel, Founders Fund,
QED Investors, Ribbit Capital, Susquehanna Growth
4 868
Equity, SV Angel, Tiger Global, Valinor Management,
Viking Global Investors
Deutsche Bank, Fortress Investment Group,
Foundation Capital, Goldman Sachs, GV, Institutional
820 Venture Partners, RRE Ventures, SAP Ventures,
5
Google Ventures, First Round Capital, Industry
Ventures, Peter Thiel, Khosla Ventures, SF Capital,
Sapphire Ventures
August Capital, Barclays Investment Bank, Charles
Stonehill, MacQuarie Capital Funds, Nelnet,
6 803.6 Neuberger Berman Group, Social Capital, Tribeca
Venture Partners, Victory Park Capital, and
individuals
Jefferies, Khosla Ventures, Lightspeed Venture
7 720 Partners, Morgan Stanley, Spark Capital, and
individuals
126
Source: Company information
SoFi is the U.S. FinTech start-up with
the highest funding so far
Funding & key investors (2/6)
Funding in
# Company million US$ Key investors
Acequia Capital, Barclays Investment Bank, Biz
Stone, Citi Ventures, GGV Capital, Goldman Sachs, JP
Morgan Chase & Co., Khosla Ventures, Kleiner
Perkins Caufield & Byers, Morgan Stanley, Rizvi
8 590.5
Traverse Management, Sapphire Ventures, Sequoia
Capital, Silicon Valley Bank, Sozo Ventures,
Starbucks, Tiger Technology Global Management,
Visa, and individuals
83North, Citi Ventures, Correlation Ventures, Kima
Ventures, Kreos Capital, Lightspeed, Lightspeed
9 578
Venture Partners, Menlo Ventures, Rakuten, Silicon
Valley Bank
Frontier Tech Ventures, Index Ventures, IT Ventures,
Machine Shop Ventures, New Enterprise Associates,
10 539 QueensBridge Venture Partners, Ribbit Capital,
Social Leverage, Susa Ventures, Slow Ventures,
Vaizra Investments
Allen & Company, American Express, Andreessen
Horowitz, CapitalG, Chris Dixon, General Catalyst
Partners, Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield &
11 478.7
Byers, Paua Ventures, Playfair Capital, Redpoint,
Sequoia Capital, Square Peg Capital, SV Angel, Thrive
Capital, Visa, Y Combinator, and individuals
Accel Partners, Atlanticus, BBVA Ventures, BlackRock,
Breyer Capital, Credit Suisse, Crosslink Capital, DAG
Ventures, Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ), Fidelity
12 419.5
Ventures, Passport Capital, Phenomen Ventures,
Sequoia Capital, Suntrust, TomorrowVentures, USAA,
Volition Capital, and other individuals
Amidzad Partners, BlackRock, Canaan Partners,
CapitalG, Coatue Management, Corigin Ventures,
DST Global, FinSight Ventures, Flint Capital,
13 392.2
Foundation Capital, Gold Hill Capital, Kleiner Perkins
Caufield & Byers,Silicon Valley Bank, Thomvest
Ventures, Union Square Ventures, and individuals
AFSquare, Bronze Investments, Data Collective,
Kapor Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, QED
14 361.5 Investors, Soma Capital, Radicle Impact, Susa
Ventures, Thomvest Ventures, Victory Park Capital, Y
Combinator, and individuals
127
Source: Company information
SoFi is the U.S. FinTech start-up with
the highest funding so far
Funding & key investors (3/6)
Funding in
# Company million US$ Key investors
C4 Ventures, Maxfield Capital, Residence Ventures,
15 308
Seer Capital
128
Source: Company information
SoFi is the U.S. FinTech start-up with
the highest funding so far
Funding & key investors (4/6)
Funding in
# Company million US$ Key investors
129
Source: Company information
SoFi is the U.S. FinTech start-up with
the highest funding so far
Funding & key investors (5/6)
Funding in
# Company million US$ Key investors
43 5 NA
130
Source: Company information
SoFi is the U.S. FinTech start-up with
the highest funding so far
Funding & key investors (6/6)
Funding in
# Company million US$ Key investors
46 Undisclosed NA
47 Undisclosed NA
48 Undisclosed NA
131
Source: Company information
U.S. Banks with FinTech Activities
A number of U.S. banks have made FinTech investments, with Goldman Sachs
leading the pack with 20, followed by CapitalOne (13) and Citigroup (12).
Additionally, the banks have also started innovation hubs focused on various
areas such as mobile banking, blockchain and cryptocurrencies, wearables,
Internet of Things, next-generation commerce, authentication, biometrics
integration, augmented reality, and big data.
132
Major U.S. banks adopt and invest
in Financial Technology
Overview
Alaska Hawaii
SunTrust Atlanta 2
▪ Feedzai
▪ Warwick Analytics
▪ Chain
▪ MultiSense
▪ Transactis
▪ Paribus
Capital One ▪ Paydiant
▪ Adaptive Path
▪ Credit Kudos
▪ Level Money
▪ Pariti
▪ BankOns
▪ WealRo
▪ Betterment ▪ FastPay
▪ BlueVine ▪ M-DAQ
▪ C2FO ▪ TradeIt
Citigroup
▪ Chain Core ▪ Plaid
▪ Clarity Money ▪ Square
▪ DocuSign ▪ Linkable Networks
▪ Square ▪ Digital Asset
▪ Bluefin Payments ▪ Plaid
▪ Revolution Money ▪ Nubank
▪ Billtrust ▪ Fundation
▪ Dataminr ▪ MoMo
Goldman Sachs
▪ Kensho Technologies ▪ CompareAsia
▪ Context Relevant ▪ Financeit
▪ Circle Internet Financial ▪ AG Delta
▪ Perseus ▪ Honest Dollare
▪ Symphony ▪ Droit Financial Technologies
134
Source: Company information
Major U.S. banks founded
innovation hubs for FinTech
Innovation hubs & focus areas
135
Source: Company information
Appendix
136
Glossary
137
Glossary
138
139
140
Authors, imprint, and disclaimer
Dev Mehta
Dev Mehta has over 10 years of experience working for market research,
legal and consulting companies. Dev worked in various sectors such as
Defense, Digital Marketing, FinTech, Insurance and Consumer Goods.
Dev completed his Post Graduate Diploma from Massey University New
Zealand, majoring in Business Management and a Masters in Marketing
Management from Middlesex University, London.
Ksenia Striapunina
Ksenia Striapunina studied Business with focus on Finance in Hamburg
and Engineering Management in Perm.
Ann-Kristin Hamke
Ann-Kristin Hamke is the Director Strategic Market Insights at Statista and
is in charge of the production of exclusive own Statista content.
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