Europe is seeing an increase in financial technology firms and solutions, according to a speaker at the Association of Luxembourg Investment Funds (ALFI) Global Distribution Conference.
The speaker referred to the growth of the “digital economy”, but suggested that it is growing fast in Europe only because the continent is lagging. He suggested that Luxembourg will be part of the solution to catch up with the US.
Financial technology will change the way companies will treat capital and the way that customers use services, as well as changing the way that those services are delivered, the speaker said.
Luxembourg companies have invested a lot in to IT infrastructure, has a high density of data companies, and offer space to store data. More than 150 financial technology companies are registered in Luxembourg already.
The speaker said that “innovation has always been part of our DNA” and that regulators aim to be both tough and innovative, too, with a focus on investor protection.
Citing products such as Skype, which had an effect on communication, and Amazon, which changed the retail sector, the speaker said that technology will revolutionise the financial services business model, saying: “We are going to see a lot of development in the field of fin-tech in the near future.”
