The year 2020 opened with a global crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic is reshaping the business and development sectors. The impact of this on the world economy is calculated to be worse than the 2008 crisis. However, there are fundamental differences between the two cases. The epicentre of the economic crisis in 2008 was big banks, whereas this time around the impact is more on the Fintech. However, they can come a long way in helping economies to recover from this crisis. If you look deeper into the segment, there are some advantages in the way they work. Most of them are typically online platforms, so they can continue to function in the remote-work environment, and most of them can process a large amount of data.
How Can Fintech Help?
Fintech could leverage artificial intelligence and machine learning to collect and analyse data to perform predictive analysis. This will help the firms to re-design the products and services to suit the changing economic landscape across the world.
Most of the fintech companies are trying to rise to the challenging situation posed by the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak. Many fintech companies are relaxing their terms and conditions and amending their service norms to help their clients deal with the crisis. Fintech across the globe – from India to Russia, U.K. the U.S etc. are using their data insights and talents to extend generosity.
Let us look at some examples. The London-based fintech Aire has come forward to act thoughtfully – they have offered free access for three months to their credit insight service. They have considered that the lenders are stretching beyond limits and are struggling to put up a real-time picture of their customers.
India’s leading fintech in cryptocurrency, CoinDX has successfully raised 3 million dollars in Series A Funding. The company can use this to launch new products and support market research and development. They are actively pursuing their vision of leading India into a 5 trillion-dollar economy. Being India’s largest exchange, they are shouldering the responsibility to lead India’s crypto adoption.
Another fintech, Digital Onboarding, extended free unlimited usage to empower their customers and help them understand how to use their digital services and access money online, without having to visit their branches.
The COVID-19 crisis has pushed organizations to re-think the conventional concepts of payments and money and try to broaden and innovate the scope of re-thinking the way business is being done. This crisis is not considered as a shock that pushes the gig economy further to new levels. Instead, many fintech like to see this as an opportunity to think about continuing the business with limited resources, shifting to co-working spaces, for instance. To acquire better fintech capabilities, many organizations are encouraging their employees to enrol in good online fintech courses.
It prompts the way work has been done. They are trying to continue their work seamlessly from remote spaces using existing tools like video conferencing and project management tools. Some organizations are considering combining virtual reality and artificial intelligence to convey information more effectively than it is done through face-to-face meetings. The COVID-19 crisis has kick-started the convergence of physical and digital working and this could prompt a significant reduction in the need for big office spaces.
Conclusion
Fintech companies are leading the way to re-look and re-imagine the way business is done today. With many organizations are following the path, there will be a substantial increase in the number of businesses leveraging technology to facilitate remote working options. Businesses are surely going to benefit from this cultural shift. Fintech companies are going to jump start a transition that is going to have a ripple effect on other economic sectors.
