UBS & Credit Suisse Merger Talks, Klarna Now Worth $10 Billion and a Crypto Exchange Gets a US Banking Charter

Today, we’re joined by Lex Sokolin to talk through a few interesting developments in the world of fintech. M&A is a continued trend in fintech, with the most recent candidates reported to be UBS and Credit Suisse, the latter of which is also in the news with a new digital bank. Will their effort somehow be different than the abortive attempts of their international peers, including JP Morgan Chase in the US and RBS in the UK? Klarna raised $650 million at a $10.6 billion valuation, making it the most valuable private fintech in the world. Why is Klarna successful where OnDeck and, arguably, Kabbage weren’t? Lastly, we venture into Lex’s realm of digital assets, with MasterCard’s fun new toolkit to help countries test Central Bank Digital Currencies and Kraken’s newly granted Wyoming bank charter. To subscribe to the Rebank newsletter, including insights, essays and written transcripts of all new episodes, please visit www.bankingthefuture.com. To subscribe to Lex’s amazing newsletter, please visit www.fintechblueprint.com. Thank you very much for joining us today. Please welcome, Lex Sokolin.