During this week’s ICT Spring, an international industry conference on recent developments in the ICT space taking place in Luxembourg and bringing together key decision-makers from around the world, Luxembourg for Finance partnered with Swift’s Innotribe to stage a session on Fintech developments.

Leveraging on Innotribe’s expertise and on showcasing Luxembourg’s position as an emerging Fintech hub, the session brought together key experts, such s Leda Glyptis of BNY Mellon, Philippe Gelis of Kantox and Tony Fish of SBT Venture Capital. They were joined by Fabian Vandenreydt of Innotribe and Nicolas Mackel of Luxembourg for Finance. The session was moderated by Jean Diederich of KurtSalmon.

The session adressed major issues like the future of banking, in particular that of bank branches which will fundamentally change in nature and might even be incorporated in outlets other than traditional bank outlets. Another topic was the challenge that Fintech poses to traditional financial institutions and how they adapt to the changing environment. Given London’s eminent role in this segment, the perspective of a “Brexit” was also raised and its potential consequences discussed.

On virtual currencies, the panel differed as to whether money transfers need an intermediate step for reasons related to trust. Adding, as some would want, such an intermediate step would affect the simplicity if not the rationale for virtual currency schemes and add a layer of complexity.

Innotribe and Luxembourg for Finance will partner also for events in New York, Singapore and in 2016 again in Luxembourg.