Finance & Money Edge

COMPLIANCE CIBC Slapped with Fine from US Regulators The Canadian bank is facing a total fine of US$42M due to poor record-keeping and using inappropriate communication methods (e.g. text messaging). The fines are imposed by U.S. regulators: Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). COMPLIANCE DOJ Cracks Down on Visa […]

BANKING New TD Bank CEO Canada’s 2nd largest bank, TD Bank, will have a new CEO come April 2025, Raymond Chun. Chun will take over from current CEO, Bharat Masrani retires next year. Chun could be considered a “TD Bank Lifer”, having joined the bank back in 1992 with their internal management training program. COMPLIANCE

AI IN FINANCE Oracle’s Netsuite Adds New AI Tools for Financial Security Oracle’s Netsuite, its cloud-based management system, announced some fancy new AI tools, including the ability to detect anomalies in your financial data to alert you to potential problems before it escalates to something bigger. Also added is the ability to interact with our

MARKETS Goldman Sachs Sees Economic Boon with a Harris Win As the battle between Trump and Harris nears in November, Goldman Sachs predicts better economic growth from a Kamala Harris win. MARKETS Foreign Investors Exit Asian Tech Equities August saw large outflow from Asian Tech equities from overseas investors as investors finding valuations too rich

COMMODITIES Central Banks on Gold Buying Spree Wondering why gold has been doing well this year? It’s because Central Banks in emerging markets are on a gold buying spree. The buying spree has setup gold as the second best performing asset (just behind crypto). Forget Dogecoin, go get those gold coins! AI in BANKING Banks

BANKING TD Bank Licking Its Wounds One of Canada’s banking giants, TD Bank, suffered its first quarterly loss in over two decades and is dealing with a $2.6 billion fine from U.S. regulators for failing in its anti-money laundering controls. TD Bank CEO, Bharat Masrani, assures everyone that this is only a temporary setback and

AI in FINANCE How Mastercard Is Incorporating AI This is a great dive into how Mastercard is incorporating AI to combat fraudulent transactions across billions of transactions and how the company handles massive amounts of data. BANKING Scotiabank Expands Network in the US One of Canada’s Big Six banks, Scotiabank, is acquiring a 14.9% stake

M&A Chevron-Hess Deal Hits Delay Chevron’s planned acquisition of Hess has hit another snag, due to the international arbitration panel that is handling Exxon’s right-of-first-refusal dispute regarding Hess’ stake in an oil project in Guyana. The panel is slated to make a decision three months after the schedule hearing in May 2025. The deal is also

FINANCE Finance Pro’s Could Automate More In a recent Mckinsey survey, they found that only 1% of CFO’s have automated more than 76% of their financial processes. While technological advancement has been available at a breakneck speed, the balance of evaluating the effectiveness, safety and practicalness has been slow to catch up. FINTECH Revolut Gets

FINTECH Revolut See Record Profits British fintech darling, Revolut, saw record profits in 2023 mainly due to a surge in users and interest income. While the fintech startup has seen a range of problems with their reporting compliance in recent years, they’re hoping those days are behind them. The positive performance comes at a good

AI in BANKING Goldman Sachs Rolls Out AI Assistant The investment bank has rolled out their own internal AI coding assistant for internal developers. The AI assistant is run off their own internal platform. This internal platform allows Goldman Sachs to fine-tune the models with its own internal data in a safe way and that

PRIVATE BANKING Deutsche Private Bank Cuts External Consultants Spending The German bank is cutting its spending on external consultants by 70%(!). The private bank’s head, Claudio de Sanctis, says: “We need to bring our expert knowledge . . . to fix our recurring problems ourselves”. Adding that the lower budget for spending on consultants will be here to stay.

INVESTMENT BANKING Investment Banking is Back Baby! JP Morgan raised its investment banking revenue forecasts for Q2 by 25% to 30%. The bank is bullish on investment banking business surging on capital markets. BANKING National Bank of Canada Acquires Canada Western Bank The National Bank of Canada has agreed to acquire Canada Western Bank in

MARKETS Texas Wants Your IPO Listing Financial firms BlackRock and Citadel are leading a group to setup a stock exchange in Dallas, Texas that is less “woke” and has less barriers than their counterparts in New York. While “wokeism” is not something one usually associates with a stock exchange (we’re politicising stock exchanges now???), the

FINANCE Saudi Aramco Files New Shares Sale Saudi Arabia is set to sell new shares for the oil giant Saudi Aramco. The offering is set to bring in approximately $12 billion for the kingdom in order to fund the Crown Prince’s economic diversification goal away from purely oil. BANKING Canada’s Big Five Banks Report Q2

MARKETS The Bond King Has Spoken, He Forecasts… Jeff Gundlach, the CEO of investment management company DoubleLine Capital, aka the Bond King, forecasts a recession for the U.S. this year. BANKING TD Bank Beats Earnings Forecast Amidst Money Laundering Turmoil Canada’s second-largest lender, TD Bank, beat earnings forecasts last quarter despite being mired in a

BANKING Digitisation of Banking is Worrying Regulators Cloud computing, AI, Fintech, open banking and more are creating new risks in banking are starting to catch the attention of banking regulators. The Basel Committee is pondering new regulations to help mitigate all the new found risks with the adoption of technology in finance. Maybe they need

CRYPTO FTX Customers Exhale a Sigh of Relief The FTX saga continues, but this is a somewhat happy ending for former customers of the sunk crypto firm:  It looks like most of FTX’s customers will get their money back (with interest!). That’s good news. MARKETS Sweden Blinks, Cuts Rates Switzerland was the first to rich

COMPLIANCE SocGen Trading Scandal in Asia Two traders from SocGen Hong Kong’s branch are mired in a “scandal” about high-risk trading that went undetected by the bank’s risk management systems. And of course in the reality-tv and social media world we live in, one of the traders in question posted his side of the story

MARKETS Bank Indonesia Raises Rates in Support of Rupiah The strong US dollar triggered Bank Indonesia (Indonesia’s Central Bank) to raise rates by 25 bps, the first time in six months, to support the Rupiah. The rate increase took many analysts by surprise. CRYPTO Binance Faces Lawsuit from Ontario Due to tight regulations in Canada,

COMPLIANCE Canadian Banks Have Become Infamous for This Canadian banks have long had a reputation to being “stable” and reserved in their behaviours. But, one thing Canadian banks are infamous for is: money laundering. This was triggered by a report that found branches of TD Bank and RBC in Ontario had allowed factions of an

M&A Google Rumoured Interested to Acquire Hubspot Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is rumoured to be interested in acquiring Hubspot, a major-player in the SaaS CRM market. Google is seeing and feeling the pinch of the impacts of AI and looking to diversify its business with the CRM behemoth. Although, no official deal has been made,

BANKING Commercial Banks Stocking Up On Treasuries US commercial banks are stocking up on Treasuries at levels not seen since the pandemic. AI Intuit Bets Big on AI Known for its accounting software, Intuit, is betting big on AI. CEO, Sasan Goodarzi, says Intuit’s strategy is to become an AI-driven expert platform. FRAUD SBF Sentenced

BANKING Citigroup Investigates Bullying Complaint by Senior Banker A senior IPO banker with Citigroup is being investigated for a bullying and harassment complaint. The complaint is made alleging at least two incidents abusive behaviour towards subordinates. BANKING Open Banking Coming to Canada An open banking framework is where banks would share customer’s data (with their

AI in FINANCE JP Morgan Offers Free AI Cash Management Tool JP Morgan has developed an AI-powered cash flow management tool, named Cash Flow Intelligence, that helps corporate treasury departments analyze and forecast cash flows. This AI tool can help treasury departments cut manual work by up to 90%. The key thing to note is

RISK MANAGEMENT NYCB Shares Tumble Due to Internal Control Problems New York Community Bancorp (NYCB) shares tumbled 25% upon disclosures of problems with internal controls & risk management. Also, leading to leadership change effective immediately, the executive chairman, Alessandro DiNello, will take over as President and CEO. BANKING JP Morgan Partners with HSBC and StanChart

M&A Capital One Merges with Discover Capital One announced last week plans to acquire Discover Financial Services to be one of the industry’s largest mergers in recent history. Experts say this merger will help Capital One create a more closed-loop environment, similar to what American Express has achieved, giving insights into customer purchase behaviours. IPO

ECONOMY Japan falls from 3rd largest economy Japan has officially slipped into a recession and also lost its spot as the world’s third largest economy, falling behind Germany. ECONOMY UK enters recession Speaking of recessions, the UK has also fallen into a recession in the latter half of 2023. FINANCE Quantum computing in finance While

RISK Deepfake defrauds $25M You have to feel a bit sorry for this Hong Kong-based finance professional who fell victim to this detailed deepfake fraud. It cost the company $25M… FUNDING OpenAI CEO Not just Good at AI OpenAI’s “Celebrity CEO”, Sam Altman, is not just good at AI, but fund raising. He’s been doing

AI AI in Finance & Banking Coming in Hot We made an announcement in our sister email newsletter, The AI Edge, that we’ll be merging any AI-related content in finance & banking with the Finance & Money Edge newsletter. And here’s the first share for this week: IBM is building out an AI governance tool

ECONOMY US Extends Lead Over China in Battle of the Biggest Economy Like an ode to one of my childhood cartoon series, Battle of the Planets, the US had a good 2023 and extended their lead over China in their battle for who’s economy is bigger. BANKING JP Morgan Shuffles Leadership Many of Jamie Dimon’s

ECONOMY Germany’s Economy Showing Cracks Since the end of World War II, Germany has been an economic powerhouse for Europe, but cracks are showing in how competitive Germany really is in today’s economy. Last year, Germany’s economy contracted by 0.3% and is seeing competition to its auto manufacturing dominance and hasn’t kept up with technology

BANKING Big Banks Report Lacklustre Earnings It’s bank earnings reporting season and some of the big guns in banking reported less than stellar results (not unexpected). Citigroup posted huge losses. While Bank of America and Wells Fargo are looking at hits to profits as well as going forward. JP Morgan was the only (so far)

AI JP Morgan Introduces Own AI Model JP Morgan introduced its own AI LLM model which will help in analyzing documents. The purpose is specific to this function to keep it lightweight. CRYPTO Indian Banks Pays Employee Benefits via Digital Currency In December, Indian banks paid out some employee benefits via a digital rupee as

MARKETS Central Banks Hold Rates, But Disagree On Where Things Are Going The Bank of England (BOE), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the US Federal Reserve held interest rates in the past week. While the Fed indicated they see possible rate cuts coming in 2024, both the BOE and ECB feel rates will continue

CRYPTO Jamie Dimon is Not a Fan of Bitcoin Outspoken JPMorgan Chase CEO, Jamie Dimon, made his disdain for cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin known at a recent Senate Banking Committee hearing. [via Grit Capital] INVESTMENT M\ubadala Focuses on Asian Investments One of the Middle-East’s largest investment firms, M\ubadala Investment announced the wealth fund will set its

FINTECH Is the World Ready for Digital Currencies? South Korea is testing a digital currency next year, joining other countries such as Hong Kong, Japan, China and India, that either announced or will be testing out their own digital currencies. The Bank of Canada is also looking into the possibility of what a digital currency

CRYPTO CEO of Binance Steps Down and Pleads Guilty Another blow for the Crypto-bro’s, CEO of Binance, Changpeng Zhao (aka CZ) was forced to resign and plead guilty to charges in the US for breaking anti-money laundering laws. The lesson from SBF and CZ? Don’t be known by just your initials…oh, and I guess don’t

ECONOMY UK Inflation Slows Down UK’s inflation rate slowed down to its lowest in two years, triggering expectations of possible interest rate cuts in the near future. IPO Starlink Mulls IPO Starlink, the satellite internet service from SpaceX, is mulling an IPO in 2024 as its satellite internet business grows. BANKING RBC Ranks 3rd Overall

BANKRUPTCY WeBankrupt… In one of the biggest falls from grace, co-working space (aka “tech” company), WeWork is set to file for bankruptcy. WeWork is a prime example of so many people drinking their own Koolaid… FRAUD SBF Found Guilty In the not surprised-at-all news of the week, Sam Bankman-Fried, was found guilty on all charges.

INVESTMENTS Fidelity Looks to Break Into ETF Market The ETF market is dominated by Vanguard, but they’ll soon have a new competitor. Fidelity is looking to convert some of their most popular mutual funds into ETF products. AI 78% of C-Suite Says They’re Using AI In a surprising stat of the week, 78% of C-suite

IPO SHEIN Working Towards IPO The fast-fashion retailer has its eyes set on an IPO on Wall Street, but still has a lot to do before it can launch an IPO. BANKING Big Wall Street Banks Facing More Job Cuts As the world is dealing with so much uncertainty right now and such a high-interest

BANKING Bank Earnings Exceed Expectations Fears of poor bank performance has been silenced after JP Morgan, Wells Fargo and Citigroup all reporting better than expected earnings. ECONOMY Africa’s $1T Trade Deal With a new free-trade deal confirmed within the African continent, the deal could mean $1T in export value for the African continent. BANKING Goldman

M&A Exxon Looks to Acquire Pioneer Natural Resources Exxon Mobil is reportedly in talks to purchase Pioneer Natural Resources. If the deal goes through, it would be the largest M&A deal of the year so far and will be the largest deal for Exxon since 1999 when it took over Mobil Corp. EXPATS China Becoming

M&A Singapore’s GIC Looking to Grab Stake in Vietnamese Grocer Singapore’s GIC (Government Investment Corp), the country’s sovereign fund, is looking to buy a 20% stake in Vietnamese grocer, Bach Hoa Xanh. The grocer is Vietnam’s third-largest grocery retailer. BANKING HSBC to Acquire Citigroup’s China’s Consumer Wealth Business HSBC continues to fortify it’s business in

MARKETS Treasury Yields Hit a High Since 2007 As the U.S. Fed held to current rates, but may continue to raise rates later this year, Treasury yields have hit a high not seen since 2007. EDUCATION US Colleges at Risk of Closing or Merging As tensions between the West and nations such as China and

IPO ARM IPO Smashes The awaited IPO of the chip designer, seems to be an initial success, surging around 31% from its IPO price. On the surface it looks like it’s surge is due to the rising tide of AI, but the truth is ARM relies more on smartphone products vs AI, so the initial

CRYPTO FTX Exec Pleads Guilty In the continuing saga of FTX, former FTX executive Ryan Salame, pleaded guilty to two criminal counts: Federal campaign finance and money-transmitting crimes. In doing so, he will forfeit $1.5 billion as part of his guilty plea. COMMODITIES Kenya to Buy Corn at Market Prices Diverting from its normal corn-buying

ECONOMY China’s Industries Showing Signs of Decline It’s not a good sign for the world when one of the biggest economies of the world shows multiple signs of decline, such as real estate, manufacturing and consumer spending. BANKING UBS Posts Historic Q2 Profits Thanks to taking over beleagured Credit Suisse, UBS posted a historic Q2