Testing times for aspiring fintechs

More than 100 fintechs have participated in the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) regulatory sandbox since its launch in June 2016, trialling their services for a limited time to a controlled number of customers under the direction of the UK’s financial services and markets regulator.

While the applications developed by these businesses span the financial services sector, transaction services featured heavily in the fourth cohort of participants involved, some of which have only recently exited the sandbox.

Euromoney asked a number of these businesses why they entered the sandbox and how they benefited.

Fineqia, which provides a platform and associated services to support security issuances and manage administration of debt securities, changed its offering as a result of its interaction with the FCA, says CEO Bundeep Singh Rangar.

“We will now utilize a blockchain-based digital platform where all key steps in the financial product lifecycle (such as bond subscription, term and price setting, legal contracts, redemption and ongoing administration) will be automated,” he explains.

“Secured bonds will be more efficiently and compliantly executed using a blockchain infrastructure with crypto assets used as collateral.”