5 key takeaways from Money20/20

Money20/20 was held earlier this year in Las Vegas. Here are 5 key takeaways from the event:

  1. The distinguishing lines between merchants and FinTechs continue to blur –  Uber created a team called Uber Money that will be responsible for its various FinTech offerings. And now Amazon is enabling utilities bill payments through Alexa devices. In the future, such trends are likely to become more and more commonplace.
  2. Financial inclusion is a big theme –  many companies are pushing to get people paid faster and even provide cash advances. Moreover, a wave of FinTechs and payments innovators are touting new solutions to help with just that.
  3. Empowered consumers mean that criminals aren’t the only fraudsters –  policy abuse (e.g. returns abuse, promotion redemption abuse) is on the rise as consumers take empowerment to new levels.
  4. There is more FinTech collaboration to come – whether it’s in the form of more acquisitions, formal partnerships or even white labeling, today’s highly-fragmented payments and FinTech market has to consolidate. It’s time for startups and legacy players to figure out how to simplify onboarding and interoperability in a fragmented landscape.
  5. Globalization is really, really hard – different countries are in different places in terms of payments. For a company to enter into a new market, it must keep up with hyper-local payment methods and experiences while also staying on top of (frequently) changing regulations.