Live data from Hacker News

No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

popularfintech.com

291–300 of 452 posts

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people have zero notion of what money is... let alone what banks offer as a business. Indeed, the entrenched investment industry has become less fair (or an outright liability) to customers, but casinos are at least honest with their customers. Gambling with other peoples money was not a real financial service until relatively recently. There is a market for a fiscally sustainable savings/investment industry, bu…

> bonded fiduciary services I never saw this term before. Google shows me nothing. Can you explain what you mean, please?

> never saw this term before

They’re mixing up a securities term (irrelevant to banking per se and cash management totally).

What they mean is getting an adviser who is bound to act as your fiduciary versus as a counterparty [1]. If you’re trusting your portfolio management entirely to a third party, they should be a fiduciary.

That said, people outside finance seem to make a bigger deal out of this than it is—in America if you’re a retail investor and you have a problem with a FINRA-member broker, FINRA arbitration will almost always side with the retail investor. Fiduciaries will tend to cost more (it’s riskier) and say no to you more; after all, you’re asking them to take decisions for you. I work in finance and couldn’t tell you which of my managers and advisers are fiduciaries because I double check what they say and limit what they can do. And this, again, has to do entirely with investments. Not banking.

More pointedly, this part is nonsense: "most people with under $2m in cash can't afford the bonded fiduciary services." What you want for cash management is yield (reward) and sweep (risk management).

[1] https://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0912/5-misconcep...

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#292
post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people have zero notion of what money is... let alone what banks offer as a business. Indeed, the entrenched investment industry has become less fair (or an outright liability) to customers, but casinos are at least honest with their customers. Gambling with other peoples money was not a real financial service until relatively recently. There is a market for a fiscally sustainable savings/investment industry, bu…

> fiscally sustainable savings Buy gold bullion, rent a bank safe deposit box, store it there. I suspect this is what comes closest to that, as of now. (Sigh.)

> Buy gold bullion, rent a bank safe deposit box, store it there

This is the worst of all worlds. You have a high-transaction cost volatile asset in a box which provides you with less legal protection than crap stored in a home with renter’s or homeowner’s insurance [1].

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/19/business/safe-deposit-box...

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#293
post #249

You can't really "take deposits and issue loans" without just becoming a bank yourself. People start new banks all the time. Or by "disrupting" does he just mean "end run around the laws and regulations"?

> People start new banks all the time Is that true in the US? In the UK there was recently a period of around 150 years during which not a single new banking licence was issued. There's a film called Bank of Dave which dramatises the attempts of Dave Fishwick - a businessman from the North of England - to set up a local community bank. It's distressing the lengths that the established banks went to to quash it. If I…

Don't know the UK banking landscape, but it doesn't look that unusual in recent times: https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/prudential-regulation/new-ba...

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#294

I don’t think disrupting banks is even possible. The time, money, and energy required is simply not realistic. There’s so many disrupt-able industries out there and I’m not even sure banking is the most beneficial one to tackle. It’s a realistic Star Wars story where the Empire always wins because… well it’s the fucking empire. They didn’t get there by losing.

> don’t think disrupting banks is even possible

They’ve been disrupted on multiple sides massively in the last twenty years. Blackrock, Vanguard and Fidelity are disruptors to their deposit and savings-account models. Quicken et al a disruptor to their lending side. Private credit, securitised lending—all taking away their balance sheet operations.

Retail banking hasn’t changed inasmuch as people like branches. But the moment you go branchless the banking options radiate, and that’s more people every day.

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#295
post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get the need for synchronous comms at all. I can book airplane tickets, food delivery, e-commerce generally, and most other things through a web interface. Not sure why I need to talk to somebody to get a mortgage aside from Know Your Customer but even then a short signing ceremony at the end would be best.

Because a lot of people don't understand how the products work or what they need. Trying to understand a complex product, with multiple options that come with advantages and disadvantages, and having adding on top that it's a very consequential decision is much easier if any misunderstanding can be corrected and explained real-time. The alternative is to do it async with some lead time for every back and forth. Your…

You should never be taking the advice on such a thing from the person who has a vested interest in you buying it.

Although you could well be right about the nature of the transaction, it's definitely a bad idea to be doing that with the bank!

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#296

No one is disrupting banks because the mega banks have the sole power of creating credit out of thin air, and no upstart fintech company has this power. To gain this power requires the creation of a bank, which as you can imagine, is probably the most gate-kept activity on earth. Andreesen talked about this in his Rogan appearance. The banks and gov brought the hammer down on crypto because it was a legitimate threat…

[deleted]

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you can't just admit you don't know wtf you are talking about checks are a valid form of payment. if you receive one you have to be able to deal with it. some checks are too large for deposit via app. as someone else pointed out, zelle has limits that make sending large payments problematic. receiving a single check is much easier. " supported by almost every bank in the US -" thanks for proving the point though

Yes, I’m sure you can find some obscure bank where it’s not supported, can you find at least 5 and tell me what percentage of people it affects? I can’t think of one scenario where someone would be willing to take a large paper check in 2025. You would actually accept a paper check from someone over $10K?

> I can’t think of one scenario where someone would be willing to take a large paper check in 2025.

You can't think very hard then?

> You would actually accept a paper check from someone over $10K?

yes. i have and will continue to do so. what, i'm going to say no to receiving money? after depositing that check, only a fraction of it was available the next day, with the remaining becoming available 3 or 4 days later.

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s the thing I can’t ever come to understand about crypto. It’s purely about perception of value. At least with some precious metal, it has a floor value as a function of its practical uses and abundance. Which leads me to believe that the only thing that could be honestly said is that a crypto is purely about winners and suckers and timing.

You're mixing up a bit everything. Bitcoin is totally different from Ethereum or Solana and these 2 networks are different from all the NFTs and meme coins launched on these Ethereum and Solana. By the way, if you thought that Trump was doing something illegal, which certainly sounds suspicious, well it isn't. This guy gives a good overview of the why https://x.com/wassielawyer/status/1881995797245600248

It’s not illegal for a celebrity to launch a meme coin or collectible. It’s not as clear if the President and his direct family can do the same.

Anti-bribery/corruption is the concern with the coins (just as it was with his hotels in the first administration). Not the legality of the coin.

But it’s moot, this admin has decided that norms don’t constrain it and it will not allow investigations into itself. So it’s de facto legal.

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are several potential mutual fund problems, but the ones most consumers are exposed to arise from institutional and private "investment advisors". There is no legal protection from banks externalizing toxic assets acquired though risky decisions onto customers, and or ridiculous ballooning management fees siphoning off actual profit. The other issues are mostly from various end-runs around acceptable market rul…

You’re mixing up adviser fees (ETFs have lower fees than mutual funds; neither is directly related to adviser fees), toxic assets, CMOs, balloon mortgages and possibly management fees and carried interest. These are related concepts inasmuch as they’re all financial terms.

You seem confused by my frustration with tools towing the company line rather than providing reliable investment advice.

Personally, I prefer retaining the option to sue people that pull stunts. But to each their own... =3

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

#300
post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fiscally sustainable savings Buy gold bullion, rent a bank safe deposit box, store it there. I suspect this is what comes closest to that, as of now. (Sigh.)

> Buy gold bullion, rent a bank safe deposit box, store it there This is the worst of all worlds. You have a high-transaction cost volatile asset in a box which provides you with less legal protection than crap stored in a home with renter’s or homeowner’s insurance [1]. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/19/business/safe-deposit-box...

Renter/homeowner insurance rarely cover precious metals unless they are in their highest premium ( read worst as store of value ) forms as jewelry or kitchenware. A vault with stronger property rights than US and insurance is probably better than your house (Singapore insured PM vault maybe) but not as good as a hole in the ground somewhere where metal detectors get a lot of false positives somewhere remote with no attachment to your identity.
Post reply on HN