Coinbase makes it simple to buy and sell bitcoins via a bank account, but plays only to the low-fee, frictionless nature of Bitcoin and fails to leverage its unique privacy aspects.
Retail banks must start innovating, improve integration across channels and consider charging fees for services to maximize their return on investment.
The bulwarks of financial privacy may, by default, become unsanctioned, underground networks like Bitcoin and start-ups run by youngsters brazen, or naïve, enough to test the legal and regulatory limits.
A cashless society is all well and good. But without the option of private, untraceable payments, life would become unbearable and institutions like marriage and religion could suffer.
Once you stop chuckling at the political incorrectness and retro-futurism of this 1959 speech, you sense the privacy dangers that lurk ahead for us in the present day.
While the banking industry was recovering from a global financial crisis and reacting to the prospects of new regulations, smart entrepreneurs were finding new and better solutions to people's problems.
More than two billion people worldwide do not have a bank account, but do have a mobile phone, making the device a direct conduit to an underserved demographic.
Patent trolls generally prefer to avoid any decision on the merits at all costs, as an adverse ruling may damage their ability to file future cases. With that in mind, smaller institutions should feel comfortable drawing a line in the sand for a fair settlement.
The common enemy of electronic payments is cash, and so any technology that makes it more convenient and more rewarding to use a credit or debit account is good for business.
