金融的未来

FUTURE OF FINANCE FUTURE OF FINANCE How to boost the UK’sfinancial services industry A blueprint for secureinfrastructure in ‘Finance chiefs havefound themselves under Distributed in Published in association with For decades the UK has been a global leader in financial services. But reforms areneeded to ensure the sector remains competitive Facing immense scrutiny and myriadmacroeconomic challenges, manyfinance leaders are questioning whether In the dynamic digital-marketplace sector, secure paymentinfrastructure is quickly becoming a competitive advantage Ben Edwards “Switzerland was an early adopterof crypto regulation and now there’sa really big industry there becausethere’s a framework that people canwork in,” Cook says. “It would be Contributors Ben EdwardsA freelance journalist specialisingin finance, business, law andtechnology, with more than a Ispeechlast year,RachelReeves, the UK chancellor,laid out her vision for the future ofthe UK’s financial services industry.Reeves described the industry asthe UK’s “crown jewel” and acknowl-edged its role in driving economic ning of the Industrial Rev-herited responsibility for many new overthe past decade.PCgames,in-game items,subscriptionservicesand micro-transactions arenow key components of a vast digi-tal-entertainment industry – and digi- olution: “In order that people may Somemarket participants alsowant to see more equitable invest- Sam BirchallFinance writer at Raconteur, focusingon the inner workings of the financefunction and the trends shaping the are incapable of managing the chal- “Londongets a lot of attentionbecause it’s a global financial cen-tre, but there’s a huge amount of Asthese marketplaces have flour-ished, consumer expectations aroundpayment experiences have also evolved.“Inthe early days of ecommerce,people were willing to accept a longerprocessif it meant their data was That’s according to a recent poll ofA dip in valuations over the past 12 He believes the UK should takenoteofhowothercountries more than 1,000 UK finance deci- The government intends to pub-lishits financial services growthandcompetitiveness strategy inJuly. According to Reeves, the initi- on CFOs to resuscitate share prices.This in turn has fuelled activity fromactivist investors, who are generallymore demanding of their executiveteam. More UK companies were tar-secure,”founder of G2A, the world’s largestmarketplace for digital entertainment.“Today, users expect instant, seamlesstransactionswithout compromising “The Nordics and parts of the Mid-dle East, such as the UAE, have donea fantastic job creating institutional stressed at work “most of the time”.Insufficient staff resources to meetgeted by activism in 2024 than inanyother European country,ac- their transactions, data and identityare safe.”Robust security infrastructure drivesseller advocacy, too. “When vendorsknowwe’ve invested in compliancestandards and intelligent fraud detec- the organisations’ needs was citedas a top reason for stress, followedbybudget constraints and theamount of time required to createreports, such as audits or year-endaccounts.Other sources of dailystress include team management,fraudand security threats,andcording to data by Alvarez & Marsal,a management consultant.Macroeconomic pressures are alsocausing headaches for CFOs. In theUK, the Labour government’s em-ployment reforms have led to higherstaffing costs and although the USand UK recently struck a trade deal ly to private equity or large-scaleinvestment houses, which supports Supporting growth and innovationWhen users feel secure, they’re more Production executiveSabrina Severino post-Brexit UK, where immigration limitingtheworst political spectrum. Design and illustrationKellie JerrardJames Lampard ment-securitymeasures are oftenseen as a mundane necessity, in reality,they are the foundation for innovationand growth.“Ouradaptive security infrastruc-ture enables us to confidently expandinto new regions, new payment meth- Commercialproduction managersAlex Datcu Design directorTim Whitlock transactions platform. “These areprofiles that generate wealth in theUK and help drive both the countryand its SMEs towards the innova- odsand new product categories,”says Skwarczek.G2A’s resilient and compliant archi-tecture has also enabled it to introducenon-gaming items, gift cards and edu- “Thestrategy is not just aboutgrowth in financial services for thesake of it. It’s about how the finan-cial services sector will enable out- The government is also seeking toattractinternational investment,so the strategy will seek to convinceglobal investors that the UK is openfor business, Cook adds. “The UK is Financial inclusion is another per-sistentchallenge.Few UK adults(about 1 million) are ‘unbanked’, but10% of the UK population is ‘under-banked’,meaning they have no Although this publication is funded through advertising andsponsorship, all editorial is without bias and sponsored featuresare clearly