City Moves for 15 September 2016 | Who’s switching jobs September 15, 2016 Benevolent.ai Benevolent.ai, a British artificial intelligence company, has appointed IBM Watson’s vce president of Watson platform; Jerome Pesenti as CEO of its technology division, benevolent technology. Jerome will also join the main board of the company. Jerome has been focused on big data and machine learning for the past 16 years. He joins benevolent.ai from IBM Watson where [...]
Bank of England warns: EU cannot replace the City October 12, 2016 London's financial services firms would rather head across the Atlantic to New York than relocate across the Channel if forced to leave London, a Bank of England deputy governor said yesterday, as diplomatic figures suggest that Europe would shoot itself in the foot if it drives a hard bargain with the City over Brexit. Jon [...]
City Moves for 22 September | Who’s switching jobs September 22, 2016 Societe Generale Societe Generale has appointed Carlos Goncalves as head of global technology services. He replaces Bertrand Lemarignier who will take up a new position within the group. Carlos started his career in the research and development team of Portugal Telecom before joining Societe Generale in 1993 as part of the IT department. Carlos was initially in [...]
America is embracing the opportunities of AI while the rest of the world frets October 25, 2016 The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) continues to generate concerns. The latest furore emerged at the start of this week. Researchers in the top ranked University College London computer science department claimed that an AI algorithm correctly predicts the outcome of 79 per cent of cases heard at the European Court of Human Rights. The current fear [...]
British Bankers’ Association set to merge with rival trade associations June 9, 2016 British Bankers' Association (BBA), the trade body that was heavily criticised for its role as the administrator of the Libor interest rate benchmark, is expected to be merged with its rival associations. According to Sky News, BBA members are reportedly set to vote in favour of plans to merge the banking trade bodies to form a [...]
The UK government now has its first official blockchain provider for public services August 1, 2016 Every single public sector organisation across the UK will be able to use blockchain technology for the first time after the government rubber-stamped fintech startup Credits as one of its approved suppliers in a major step forward for the potentially revolutionary technology. It's the first time a company working with blockchain's distributed ledger technology (DLT) has been given the thumbs up, and [...]
It’s official: Saving for a house is more important than saving for a pension (to under-35s, anyway) September 21, 2016 Remember back in August, when Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane was branded "irresponsible" after he suggested he'd rather invest in property than put money into a pension scheme? Well, it seems the nation's millennials agree with him, after a study found saving for a home is three times more important to them than putting [...]
Small housebuilders are the answer to the housing crisis. Here’s how we can help them August 18, 2016 The housing crisis is one of the most important policy challenges we currently face. As the gap between supply and demand grows, the lives of hard-working families become harder. While there are obvious societal issues, the economy also suffers. In 2014, Bank of England governor Mark Carney admitted that the UK’s booming housing market had become [...]
Alternative mortgage lender LendInvest posts a 133 per cent rise in revenue as profit flattens out October 7, 2016 Alternative mortgage company LendInvest has posted a 133 per cent increase in gross revenues for the year to 31 March 2016. Revenue leapt to £32m, up from £14m in the year before. Profits for the lender – which is targeting the funding gap left by the retreat of high street banks from the sector – remained flat however, coming in at £3.4m, up [...]
Three ways life has actually improved for millennials since last year August 15, 2016 Millennials… they might get a bad rap for being lazy, whiney and selfishly obsessed with selfies among other things, but it's a generation that's been saddled with debt, spiralling living costs and lower wages than any previous generation. And the socio-economic situation of young people has remained largely unchanged over the last year, new research reveals, while the bad news is, some areas [...]