1026. Insights: Our fintech predictions for 2026

24:17because I think taking these propositions to the Middle East, to New York, and trying to explain precisely how this thing works and why it's sensible to invest in is going to be more work than it will do in this London context. So, yeah, I think it's definitely something to, I think 2026 will be an absolutely key year. Like, I think if some stuff doesn't get sorted this year, like London is really, really screwed. But we're not completely screwed yet. Okay.

24:45Laura Watkins:A slight positive, I think, to end on. And so with that, we wrap up our 2025 prediction lookback. But what's next? Find out after the break as we dive into our bold predictions for 2026. Hey folks, David Breer here, CEO of 11FS. Here's something you might not know about me. I get a lot of people trying to impersonate me online. Fake profiles, scam emails, the lot. And a big part of that comes from data brokers. Hundreds of them quietly collecting and selling your personal information. Your phone number, email, home address, job title. All out there and all fueling identity theft, scam calls and spam.

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26:07And yes, it's risk-free with a 30-day money-back guarantee. You'll find the link in the description. In a classroom of sodas, most stay quiet. Then there's Mr. Pibb, sweet cherry, bold outbursts, the kind of flavor that gets attention. Bull kick of charity And you'll miss the pin

26:31Laura Watkins:Welcome back to Fintech Insider Insights. Before the break, we looked back on our predictions from 2025. Now it's time to dig into what we think is going to happen this year. So, David, what are you predicting for the year ahead? So I've sort of cheated, I'll be honest with you, as generally I will have a go at doing and gone for two. So I'm like, even small, like they're both quite specific. So I'm not spreading my bets quite as wildly as you did, Laura, on your one last year. But my first one was like digital riches. So we talk about digital riches all the time. It's the sort of shortcut for what we think a good digital product is, which is it's real time, intelligent, contextual, human, extendable and social.

27:12For me, I think we're starting to see the seeds of those things really going mainstream. I'm particularly thinking about if you think the things like Revolut street modes like actually there are there are amazing things now where you're like these things are only possible as services because people are using the context of how to provide services to people really really effectively so that's that's my first one I think we're going to see more things in this year that are basically only now possible to deliver to people because of the advancements that we've had with technology, mobile phones, and really using all of the context of those things in that guide.

27:55So do you want to talk about that one first or shall I go into the second one as well?

27:58Laura Watkins:Yeah, no, let's dive into it. So, Ross, what was kind of your take on this sort of AI sort of running the whole machine? Like how does that sort of play into that idea of like digital riches and is this sort of is this end game for digital riches or is is there more nuance to it than that well i think towing the 11fs line and um the idea that you know financial services is ever only one percent finished um i don't think we're ever quite in end game territory but no i like this and and and i understand the premise behind it um and and i agree with it right i think you know riches is such an interesting concept and I think when you start to unpack each one of those like what does it mean I think the one that's always stood out for me as maybe being slightly counterintuitive given that we're talking about um sort of digital um experiences is the H is human um but you know what was always sort of um then made sense to me as well if you can deliver something that is real time, if you can deliver something that is intelligent and that is contextual, um, it's going to be, it's gonna be pretty human.

29:14Um, and I think that's the really cool thing about this, you know, the C in terms of contextual, you know, the, the, the Revolut street mode is a really good example, you know, that is taking, um, these emerging technologies and applying them in a way that solves for a really acute problem. You know, we're seeing fraud, um, pretty much the highest it's ever been, right? You know, and, and, and like on an industrial scale, and we've got this incredible spike and this incredible problem, um, with phones being snatched out of people's hands, um, on the streets of London. And that's something that has become such an issue in the last couple of years.

29:56And I think what's really cool is Revolut have looked at that and okay, fine, And you can argue that that goes outside the realms of traditional financial services in terms of the types of solution that they've offered. But they've gone, no, you know what, this is important. We're going to solve for this particular problem. And for me, that's understanding the context. It's taking those technologies and it's using them in a way that solves for really important customer problems, whether that's inside traditional financial services or outside traditional financial services. And yeah, I think we're going to see more of it.

30:31I really do. So I like this prediction.

30:33Laura Watkins:Nice. Kate, what's your take on this? Well, I mean, I'm still mainly just trying to get over my rage that David was allowed two predictions when I was told I could only have one, but I'll put that bitterness to one side. I feel a bit torn on this prediction because I suppose it's just the word mainstream, right? So I think we've definitely seen, I think the platforms which are still truly capable ball of executing riches is still quite a specific field right and you know that varies from market to market but there's only a handful of players in each market which are if we're honest like truly capable of delivering experiences which would meet our sort of riches benchmark like we know that lots of the kind of traditional banks are trying to reconfigure their internal structures to kind of connect together like the data sources and all the sort of stuff that the platforms that would make these types of journeys possible but they are like still full-on struggling like a lot all the time right so only a handful of people are going to be able to deliver these types of journeys we know that those platforms are becoming more and more mainstream more and more people are using them but they're still not necessarily with maybe the exception of the likes of like new bank in brazil right like who are crushing it um there are still markets where the vast majority of customers are still transacting on these legacy banks for at least part if not all of their day-to-day spending.

31:55So, and I was a bit taken aback almost actually towards the tail end of last year, I was doing a research project where I was actually interviewing lots of customers who were using kind of the paid platforms of the likes of N26 and Bunk and Revolut. So, you know, fairly early adopters of some of these platforms. And I was surprised to Ross's point about the human element. I was still surprised how much it mattered to these people to have a sort of real world human fallback for their money. Like actually, I spoke to a Revolut Ultra customer, one of the most invested, literally, customers in the world in their digital fintech.

32:33And even he was saying, I still have my traditional bank down the road. And he lived in Austria. Because I want to know that if something goes wrong with my money, I can physically drive there in my car and bang on the door until somebody fixes my problem for me. So I still think that human component is still key. and I think it'll be interesting to see whether the likes of things like Revolut's street functionality help to give customers more confidence that these digital banks can truly be there for them in these moments where things go wrong. But I still don't think we've scratched that itch for customers, right?

33:11Like people still really want to know there is a human fallback. Yeah, I really like that point on the technology. I've been saying for a while now that the banks that have kind of come into the space, if you look at like a Monza or a Revolute, inside they're fundamentally different beasts, but externally, actually the products that they've built are very similar to traditional banks. And actually, I think what we're going to see over the next couple of years, less like a couple of year prediction now, I think I've only ever made one of these a few times, haven't I? The first one was when I was like, somebody's going to buy Starling in three years time, I reckon.

33:44But I think the clock's still ticking on that one. But I think on that one is, I think we start to see the difference between what's on the inside making a difference to what's on the outside. So you are right, Kate. I think the ability for most organizations to do this becomes exposed because actually the sort of spaghetti of technology internal makes it really, really difficult to do. But for somebody like a Monzo, somebody like a Revolut, somebody like a Nubank, then actually it's just part of good building of product. Um, so yeah, that, that gap and, and by that probably the MPS gap or the customer satisfaction scores across the board become, you know, even more polarized between the, the traditional banks and the, the neobanks.

34:31Can I, can I just pick up really quickly on that point? Cause I think it's spot on. I think there's a lot of the big traditional banks who have kind of taken a big sigh of relief and kind of gone. Oh, you know, yeah. Yeah, like Monzo and Revolut, that was kind of scary, but actually now, you know, they're just banks and we know how to deal with banks and sure they've got a bit of market share, but now this is really just a sort of a front-end user design challenge. And I think that is such a dangerous mindset to be in right now as a big bank because of everything that Kate and David have just described, you know, that sort of truly digital internal setup from like technology teams, culture, organization, all of those things.

35:09and then you start to put, you know, technologies like AI taking a real foothold and actually I think the potential for those guys to accelerate away and that's then before you even start to think about the sort of like AI native challenges that are going to come to market as well and sort of leapfrog. I think that's such an interesting point.

35:30Laura Watkins:And that kind of fully digital setup probably leads us nicely into your second prediction, David? Yeah, this one I think is really interesting because obviously, I mean, here in the UK, there's a lot of noise around digital identity. You know, I really think quite clearly digital identity is going to be a new power play in the market. When you look at the noise on both sides of the fence with regards to people who are pro and unpro and people who are, you know, against it and are, you know, sort of, uh, uh, maybe building tinfoil hats and, you know, worrying about people listening to their phone calls at the same time.

36:10But it's like, you know, you've got to be, you've got to be crazy to not think this is a great advancement when it comes to people having control of their identity and people being in a situation where you actually, uh, put the power of those things into the individual's hands rather than a centralized body um but the devil is always in how you do it so you know to be really clear i am so pro digital identity if the users are put in control of their identity um i'm so con of it if it's some dystopian world where we're putting the government in charge of all of the things because like uh you know doesn't always work out that well does it i think we tried it a few times with trains we're giving it another go never works out that well you know so um i think the idea of identity being kind of like an underlying infrastructure piece for doing all of the things that we've always wanted to do in financial services is absolutely true.

37:03It's just whether we actually get to the world where we get what we want rather than what somebody else wants us to get.

37:11Laura Watkins:Kate, any thoughts on that? Is anyone sort of close to this already or is this sort of something that needs to be built from nothing? Well, I think it's, I mean, labor are mandating in it right so like it's a it's a we're pretty close to it because it's going to be happening but it's just what what is it gonna be happening well what it actually happening means you know what i mean so uh well yeah i mean they've committed to it being in place by the end of the current parliament which in uk political lingua like means what 20 29 i believe unless like our government collapses before then which you know could happen that's definitely not my prediction for next year by the way like this is not a politics show but i mean it's definitely happening in other parts of the world like other parts of the world have been exploring this space already so you know this isn't net new territory there's lots of examples for the UK and other markets which might move in this direction as well to kind of look at both are like things that have worked well and things that haven't so um I think it's yeah I think customers there's just such a residual distrust but I think it would be really important as part of the rollout for there to be or discussion about like how this ID could be used in financial services for gain.

38:24Like we see a lot of underserving in financial services because banks aren't willing to take risks on certain customers because they profile a customer as having X or Y likely outcomes based on fairly outdated data sources. Like a kind of much more positive outcome will be actually if we can profile and understand customers more accurately and if we can actually understand people's propensity to kind of take and use credit responsibly or kind of make and manage investments responsibly, etc. All those types of things could fundamentally change how money is distributed within society and how people are able to access funds to fund things in their lives.

39:07So ID, if it could help, kind of challenge some of these outdated risk models would be crazy exciting. But I'm not an expert at all. So I've literally no idea how that would happen. But I would love to see that happen if there was a form of ID that could help us actually lend responsibly and more broadly to people that currently aren't lent to. Yeah, I mean, I mean, a much more primitive level than that. I don't mean primitive like caveman. I mean, more like primitive, like from a technological perspective, because actually, when you start looking at, for all of the reasons that you said that digital riches is going to be difficult for people.

39:40Then, you know, if you look at any bank around the world, digital identity is managed in gigantic monolithic slabs. So, you know, the idea that actually you could even just be able to very rigorously and consistently identify yourself for a digital service, you know, your own personal ID API, that would be a game changer for financial services Because if you could absolutely trust who you say you are, you are, then actually it changes the efficiencies in all of those systems, like full sweep. And then actually beyond that, Kate, as you say, you start getting into, well, you know, how do I use my data for me?

40:21And actually, how do I create a system that can actually allow me to give access to it and revoke access to it rather than giving access to all of it? you know somebody who's run a business for a decade I think I've literally got my passport in like paper format in thousands of people's offices because that's how I've had to do it and I'm like I might as well just post it on the internet at this stage you know I mean so so actually being able to revoke access to those things as well as provide them would give me a level of control over my data that actually just doesn't exist in the existing systems okay well let's see how that one

40:58Laura Watkins:stacks up in 2026. But Russ, you are up next for your prediction. Do you want to tell us what it is? I do. I think investments are going to become a key customer battleground in a way that we haven't seen before next year. I think my slight caveat is I think we're at least going to see some real movement here in the UK. um but yeah that's my prediction okay um how kind of significant is the role in sort of regulation or policy and sort of shaping those behaviors or is it going to be something you know else besides that that kind of makes that a sort of key customer battleground i think there's a couple of factors i think policy and regulation is um is huge right you I think when we look at investments and how investments have been positioned for a really long time, I think they've been a bit of a branding and a PR problem.

42:02I think it's always been positioned in terms of risk and weirdly sort of like akin to gambling. All of the messages are the value of your investments might go down as well as up. and you know the reality is that regulation around consumer protections and policy and all of that sort of stuff that's kind of what providers had to lead with and it's funny because that over time imprints on you know consumers psyche I think and so there's a maybe a mistrust and a hesitation around investments products there's absolutely a you know a sort of gap in sort of understanding around education and these things when it comes to investments.

42:52But I think actually maybe that's another thing that's starting to shift, right? I think consumer confidence around some of these more complex or traditionally considered complex financial products I think is starting to grow, right? And I think, you know, there's different types of investing. Of course, there's like the sort of ETFs and the mutual funds and the sort of like, you know, set and forget. And that's all good on one end. And then, of course, there's, you know, sort of crypto and maybe sort of like different asset classes. You know, if you look at something like chip, for example, you know, you've been able to invest in non-traditional asset classes for quite a while, like, you know, art.

43:37And, um, you know, we saw a massive uptick over the last couple of years, although it's tailed off a little bit recently in like, um, barrels of whiskey and all of those types of things. So people seem a little bit more, um, open to these types of things. But I think one of the main drivers, um, is the government, right? You know, we've had massive, massive economic stagnation in this country for a really, really long time. the UK economy has grown once out of the last seven months, which is, I just think, an absolutely staggering statistic. And of course, the government are looking at every possible lever that they can pull to sort of drive some of that growth.

44:25One of those levers that was announced in the budget in November was they're going to reduce the amount of money that can be held in a cash ISA. with the, you know, I suppose assumption that people will then put more of that money into stocks and shares and that in turn will sort of drive the growth of companies and sort of stimulate the growth in economy. So I think there are a number of driving forces that are sort of like pushing things in this direction. And so I think people are going to want a piece of that pie. You know, you've traditionally, this has kind of been the realm of, you know, the IGs, the Vanguards, the whoever else, sort of very specific, you know, investment providers.

45:13I think we're going to see more movement among non-traditional players in this space as we look ahead into 2026 and beyond. And I think potentially how that plays out is going to be quite interesting.

45:27Laura Watkins:Okay, I want to come to you on that sort of confidence in investing. As Russ said, it's improved, sort of up to 39 % from 33%. How much difference do you think that makes? What is driving that, do you think? I mean, we definitely saw a big uptick during the pandemic, right, and people signing up to investment platforms. I guess people had time. Maybe there's just more people that have had more opportunity to kind of like dabble a little bit and you probably build confidence by dipping your toe in and kind of building incrementally. Yeah, football wasn't on. people just looking for stuff to do aren't they really yeah just just invest away um so i suppose i think and building confidence i think is key but i completely agree with ross about like you know obviously the macro factors here i think are really important like the government will steer people towards investing in the uk and also around the world i think if you kind of step back even further like i think the the bigger thing here is that you know we have a globally aging population But we also globally have a trend of governments not being able to cover the costs of aging from a sort of state level, which is putting more responsibility back onto individuals to build their own financial reserves far later into their lives.

46:44So I think that is the only way to really do that is to invest sensibly from an early point in your financial life. So I think we are going to see definitely an increase in investing. We will have to see an increase in investing in order for us not all to kind of get to the age of 70 or 80 and not have any money, basically, given the way that state pension support is going. So, yeah, I think we'll see definitely an increase in investing. I'm interested to definitely see the impact of targeted support, which is this new UFC initiative focused around providing better investment. I was going to say advice, but it's not meant to be advice, is it?

47:26It's somewhere between guidance and advice. But that's meant to be the idea that you can give people steers on how they might invest based on sort of common traits. So if you kind of fit into the profile of a cohort, someone like you would probably do these five things and it wouldn't be a disaster like actually how is that going to play out in a digital experience and to come back to the previous conversation around you know digital riches like i think that could be where the likes of new bank revolute chime could like completely blow the competition out of the water because they could create some of these if they could take that new permission and really run with it in a way that traditional banks just don't have the data or the connectivity to.

48:08So, yeah, I think investments, yes, and better advice or guidance, however you bucket it, to support those investments also, yes.

48:16Laura Watkins:Does that equally tie in to your own prediction around big banks starting to take young people seriously again? Well, I mean, I suppose, yeah, I hadn't really thought about it from the context of investing, but yeah, it's definitely one of my, like, things that I'd love to chat about is trying, how can we help young people to invest? So I suppose, yeah, my prediction, I think my prediction, yeah, is that big banks will start to take young people seriously. Again, I think for two long incumbent traditional banks, and you pick your phrase of choice, have just taken it pretty much for granted as a novelty benefit for a student rail card.

48:52And a parental recommendation will set them up for like their next generation of customers and they'll just trot in the door with pretty much no questions asked. And now I am hearing personally firsthand, lots of banks really start to worry about their aging customer bases and really taking note of the youth offerings of Monzo, Revolut, etc. etc. So I think 2026, I think will be the year that big banks will try but not necessarily succeed to reconnect with the next generation of consumers. Because, again, I think maybe there's been a slightly blasé attitude in the past about, you know, oh, it's just a spending card.

49:34But I think if you are a big bank and you spend a ton of money on a promotional campaign with a rail card or in social benefit of choice you open that account and then your customer just drops their student loan into that account but then instantly shifts it straight out to a Monzo or Revolut card and then when they go get their first job they open their savings accounts with Monzo or Revolut and when they open their investing accounts they open those of Monzo and Revolut and when they get their mortgage they get their mortgage with Monzo potentially through their new Habito acquisition which may or may not happen right so I think we're starting to see the penny drop that it really really matters now that the experience you've been offering to these young customers has just been poor for such a long time um so yeah we'll

50:20Laura Watkins:see what happens david what's your take on that um what's some stats um by 2024 50 percent of adults used a neobank or a fintech and by the end of 2024 71 percent of uk adults held their main debit card with a big six bank which was actually down from 85 percent in 2020 so like are the fintechs kind of leading the charge on this particularly uh in terms of young consumers um and can the big banks sort of fight back yeah i mean i'd say the stats definitely pointing towards that aren't they i think it both sort of combined agrees with what kate was saying earlier on as well because actually i mean even even when the big banks get this right they kind of get it wrong.

51:02If you look at, you know, NatWest acquired Rooster Money, didn't they? And we haven't really seen a great deal of progression there. You know, it's, it feels like the whole thing is like Credit Suisse and UBS. It's like, there's going to be like soaring noises for five years, and then there might be something coming out of it. But the, the integrate integration transformation stuff will stop anything happening, which pretty much like kills the business, doesn't it? You

51:31to be able to provide great, you know, parent to kids, parent to youth, you know, graduation into a full current, you know, as Kate says, gone like frigging Midland bank got me for like 15 years because of a clipboard and a pen, you know what I mean? Like those days are, those days are definitely gone, you know, but, um, so touching just quickly back on what Ross was saying about investments. So I think the, I think the investment point, I think is super interesting. we're gonna we're gonna sort of traverse two of these things at the same time here guys sorry i think the investment thing is really interesting because it's like all good advice around investments is like don't be a day trader like it's not like you know it's not a good idea like it just doesn't work out very well for you and then the cycle on the investment markets are not changing at all like so actually like we're still in the similar cycles that we've seen since the, you know, 20s in terms of the changes around the market and the fluctuations that you see.

52:32And the advice still is do an investment and then just forget about it for as long as you can until you actually need to, you know, desperately need that money. So what's increasing is like our level of access, the speed of access to the markets. But even then, if you look at where somebody like a nutmeg, you know, had been and now is JP Morgan, whatever, like actually really that's buying into like four predetermined funds that people's you know risk tolerance as you said earlier on ross is the sort of the predetermining factor of where you go and which one of those you get to so so we've got sort of two bits there we've got the you know do i think that you know i should buy sneakers and they're an investment well i'd never mix things that you do for investments with things that you do with pleasure it's why buying into whiskey seems like a bad idea.

53:22I like drinking it. Like there's a good chance I might just drink my investment and that's a bad idea. You know, like, uh, it's like trainers. I'll never buy trainers for, uh, for, for investments because I want to wear them. You know what I mean? Like I would negate my investment really quickly, you know? Um, so, so I think the, the sort of markets becoming increasingly easy to access. And actually, I mean, we're seeing private markets access through fintechs as well. You're like, that's a, that's a whole different kettle of fish but but almost i feel like we're putting there's a sort of similar narrative to what we see in the retail banking space as well which is just giving people access to markets doesn't necessarily democratize a whole market and therefore make it easier for people to do stuff if they've got no idea what they're doing you know and and really that's the that's the challenge back back to exactly as you guys were saying about the human bit is i just think there's a really strong position for advisors still, but actually they're not disabled by their organization.

54:23They're enabled by it. And then actually, whether you want to invest in, you know, whiskey or Jordan's or, you know, stocks or a fund or whatever, then they're actually being able to do that in a really efficient way, I think makes a great deal of sense. So yeah, I, I agree with Ross's prediction, albeit it, you don't want to put like formula on cars in the hands of people who've just passed their driving test you know like there's got to be a a level of onboarding that makes that that powerful tool really useful to them if that makes sense that that for me is absolutely spot on and i think that's ultimately what's gonna determine who's successful in this space going forward and who's not right like because it's it's not just about oh here's an investment um account and you can just start putting money into it.

55:11It's about helping me understand, am I even set up financially? Am I ready to start investing? If I'm ready to start investing, then how much can I afford to invest? What's my risk appetite? It's being able to give me, it's back to the riches point and context and all of that sort of stuff up front. Yeah, I think that's absolutely spot on. And I like, listen, sort of tying it back together. I also like Kate's prediction about, you know, you've got to start thinking about how you re-engage with young people. Honestly, I mean, from my experience, you know, David, you mentioned your experience with Midland.

55:48Like I signed up with Santander because they went, here's a picture of Jenson Button and we'll give you an overdraft. And so it was kind of like, you know, but I think if you try it back to all, I think what's show it's you know what's the what's the what's the better consumer proposition like what are the outcomes all of that sort of stuff rather than um here's a recognizable sports uh sports person and a way to get into debt very quickly um so yeah i think the bar is really low um but okay i think

56:19Laura Watkins:you're up to his bar so i want to i want to take you very quickly into one of my predictions which actually is sort of slightly back into the the the jensen button territory actually um so see what you think. But I think that the role of brand in financial services is going to be more important than ever in 2026. And what I mean by that is that companies will need to lean into their brand recognition as a key benefit. So it's no longer a nice to have for things like term sheets, raises, IPOs, partnerships, M &A, or bringing more value when it comes to being bought out. So, you know, we've seen Habitoy this week go card list, et cetera.

56:58Laura Watkins:But equally in a sort of AI heavy marketing landscape where authenticity is key. A strong brand is going to be harder to lose in the noise. We've already seen some green shoots of this in 2025. Aberdeen rebranded from Aberdeen without the vowels or Aberdun or however you say it, to be taken more seriously. Starling did a grown up rebrand with mixed results as we discussed after dark. Nationwide bought Virgin Money but are as yet maintaining the Virgin Money name. And there were equally so many fintech and sports partnerships to try and create household names out of invisible infrastructure players.

57:33Laura Watkins:For example, Airwallex sponsoring the F1. And literally last week, as they got that enormous valuation, the Airwallex CEO admitted that he needed to lean into their branding to make them more of a name to compete with Stripe and so on, which is why they did the F1 thing in the first place. Sokin sponsored Man United Infuse hired Birgit Skarstein who is a Paralympic gold medalist as a chief inspiration officer and as well as more consumer facing brands did sort of very similar things Robin Hood teamed up with OCC Nice football team Bitpanda with Arsenal David Beckham, Bank of America there's just a huge amount of investment in brand and I think looking ahead 2026 is likely to be a year with inflation still rising, cost of living a consolidation in the market's going to be rife in terms of smaller or less successful fintechs being hoovered up to take tech, talent, customers, brand name, or all of those things.

58:30Laura Watkins:Fintech brands are going to be looking to establish themselves and authenticity is going to be essential. And coupled with that authenticity, as AI continues to flood sort of social networks and brands kind of lean into AI for content creation, the line between what's real, what's fake what's human what's machine generated becomes blurred and a term that I found online by really like is like AI marketing slop um could be everywhere and only those with like a clear identity will stand out in that kind of just malaise online of just bad brand marketing um so that's my take obviously with a very marketing focus hat on uh but very interested very quickly as I know we're out of time but just to get a few thoughts from you guys on that David what do you I think it's a really interesting one.

59:18I think it's a difficult thing to sort of understand why these people really do these things in the first place. Like my experience in big banks is typically those brand sponsorships are basically because the CEO wants to do a thing. And it's like the CEO likes Liverpool or the CEO likes the Olympics. And it's like, all right, we're going to drop 200 million pounds because the CEO likes the Olympics. It's like, yeah, we're going to do that. It's because essentially what they're trying to do is rub their old brand on a credible brand to hope some of it shines off, you know. So, but for when I start seeing like Revolut doing Formula One or Airwallux doing Formula One or I'm like, does Nikolai just really like Formula One?

1:00:03Like maybe he just really likes Formula One because like, what is it that people see in those brand association things that make it make sense? I personally would spend more time on my own brand developing it and doing things and getting it known for those things than I would do trying to just associate myself with other brands in order to adopt some of the traits from their brands. Because their brand's never going to be yours, you know, whereas actually your one can be its own thing, you know. So I think there's, I can see why people hack to communities, but equally, I would equally say, you know, maybe think about doing the work as well.

1:00:42Laura Watkins:Oh, yeah, definitely. I mean, I think that's what I mean by like authenticity is key. If it's just totally inauthentic for you to slap your logo on, you know, a pre-existing brand that, and it doesn't really give you any gain from it, then yeah, you haven't done the hard yards on like what your brand actually means and stands for and, you know, cares about. No, but you've got lots of tickets to the Formula One. I think that's the lesson from this one. Maybe that's true. Kate, quick word from you. Yeah, no, I think I completely, yeah, we've seen such a crazy rush of sponsorship announcements and stuff like that, as you rightly said last year.

1:01:16So I completely agree. I suppose we've just reached a point as well where there are just so many brands in the market across every single part, basically, of the financial services ecosystem within the fintech space, right? So I think the Airwallex CEO quote that you mentioned, I also found that really interesting to read. It's definitely a brand where I feel like I understand what they do, but I couldn't necessarily tell you why they were different to loads of other payment partners and payment providers in that space. so I definitely think there is an important really important role for brands play in this next stage of fintech development because we've now got lots of quite established players and it's going to be about as you say, who buys who who survives, who kind of pushes the top and brand is going to play such a huge part of that and customers need customers are very lazy, like I say that from a place of love but people only can remember a certain number of companies in their head, right?

1:02:18And if you are sat there deciding that 2026 is the year that you want to move into investments because investments are going to be big in 2026 as we've already decided, then like who are they going to be the companies that you choose to go and look at? And part of that will be driven by, you know, Google or Chachupati, but brand recognition will be such a huge part of how you then filter that list and make your decisions. So a brand, I think, is going to be key.

1:02:42Laura Watkins:Ross, very, very quick final word from you. quick final word the kit the Robin Hood niece kit is really really beautiful and it properly stands out well there you go proving my point okay but that's what it's all about right that wraps up today's discussion thank you so much to you guys for joining me where can people find out more about you all David yeah always lucky on LinkedIn feel free to reach out on there lovely Russ yep likewise LinkedIn Are we all just going to say LinkedIn? Kate? I mean, I feel like I can't now. I mean, yes, I'm also on LinkedIn. Or you can email kateallenfest.com or find me in the pub because I'm not doing Dry January ever again because I did it once and it then became a global pandemic and all the bars closed.

1:03:33So I'm not going to do that again. I feel like you somehow caused it by doing that. I feel like I caused it. I feel like I caused it by doing Dry January in 2020. It was the worst decision of my life. If I can't go to the pub, nobody can leave their house for four months. I broke into a Chinese lab and released COVID to the world. Well, there's a prediction. You heard it here first.

1:03:53Laura Watkins:Goodness me. Wow. On that bombshell. You can find me, Laura Watkins, on LinkedIn or podcasts at 11FS.com. Thank you so much for listening. If you like what you've heard, follow our podcast and please join in the conversation. Give us your own predictions. Find us on social media. just search for 11FS or Fintech Insider or again the email is podcasts at 11FS.com Thanks very much and goodbye.