The world is changing rapidly. What was science fiction just a couple of years ago, today is a reality. We witness anything from robots performing manual jobs to agricultural drones monitoring the weather conditions. The AI apps and machine learning apps are gaining momentum. But today I am going to talk about fintech trends for 2022 and the future of cryptocurrency. What to expect? Is blockchain going to replace the old and good dollar bill? Here is the answer.
In 2022, not only blockchain will go far beyond Bitcoin and cryptocurrency but penetrate into the nonprofit sector, talent procurement, and have a drastic impact on fintech trends in general.
Let’s have a look at these sectors separately.
Blockchain in Nonprofit Sector
Why do analysts predict that blockchain will be the favored currency in the nonprofit sector? The answer is simple. It is an easier and more profitable way of securing donations — especially from the younger generation.
Not only can the nonprofit secure higher income for their organizations, but they will also eliminate transaction costs like bank fees and avoid further bureaucracy.
As Founder and CEO of Cloud for Good Tal Frankfurt told Forbes, ‘’Blockchain is reestablishing trust in nonprofits’’. And here is what she refers to by saying that blockchain pays for the good for non-profits.
Firstly, blockchain has no geography. It can cut costs, control financial risks such as fraud and respond more quickly to emergencies.
Secondly, the digital currency is easily traceable throughout the ledger which adds to trust and transparency.
Finally, the transaction is easy to do. All you need is to open a crypto-wallet to receive donations. The donors are directly linked to the wallet. A lot of blockchain apps contribute to the ease of transactions.
Blockchain and Talent Procurement
Blockchain can amazingly alter the recruitment system. The application of blockchain technology to talent acquisition is related to the validation of recruitment data, such as resumes, references, and qualification checks.
The academic credentials can be uploaded on the decentralized ledger and can never be altered resulting in transparency and a fair recruitment system.
This process is promoted by what is called ‘’tokenization of talent’’.
Talent tokens are personal tokens that relate to a person’s career potential and the benefits that the token holder can access. Talent Token holders can provide rewards to those who want to join in their career growth. This is a type of social money that makes contributors committed to personal growth. Both the talent and the supporter benefit from rewards distributed by the network.
Suppose a child’s identity is registered on the blockchain and receives an automatic token as soon as they enter the education system. Now, all the educators that work with the child with be rewarded for the child’s success as they are linked to the child’s personal token.
It’s hilarious what drastic reform the education system will go through if every educator is rewarded for student success.
Blockchain and FinTech Sector Trends
Banks Will Get Better at Delivering Personalized Insights
What impact will blockchain have on the banking system? Blockchain technology can be used for various transactions like money transfers and record keeping. Digitalization of payment systems saves millions of dollars in transaction costs as well as cuts inefficiency.
But there is one trend that almost all banks are going through in 2022 and that is personalization. Combined with artificial intelligence and machine learning, banks are going to create hyper-personalized experiences. Customers are going to be notified about their potential shortfalls in their accounts, for example.
And as mobile baking is becoming a norm for large financial institutions, next-generation banking apps are developed that bring the financial institutions and the customers closer based on previous experience and transaction history.
More Banks Will Offer Cryptocurrency Services
As blockchain is gaining momentum in the financial realm, a lot of banks are ready to adopt this technology as a signaling sign of fintech trends.
J.P Morgan
A good example is J.P Morgan that started using blockchain technology to help improve money transfers last year. The blockchain solutions of this bank create options to conduct payment processing and verification for large payments in much lesser time.
This New York-based investment bank is offering financial solutions to major corporations and governments. It is launching a major cryptocurrency, dubbed “JPM Coin”. Each JPM Coin will be equivalent to one U.S. dollar. After completing the transaction, the coins will be returned in the form of U.S. dollars.
Swedish Central Bank
The Swedish Central Bank is testing a new digital currency called the e-krona. The Corda distributed ledger technology is the solution applied for this project. They are now moving ahead with their experimentation phase by including 2 more banks.
HSBC and Wells Fargo
HSBC and Wells Fargo have begun using a blockchain platform to settle U.S. dollar, Canadian dollar, pound, and euro transactions. According to Forbes contributor, HSBC moves $20 billion from paper to blockchain.
The attraction goes deeper than cost savings or networking efficiencies. There are other considerations like the security of digital translation and the elimination of potential errors and fraud in bookkeeping.
BankProv
Another example is one of the 10th oldest banks in the US 0 BankProv that offers full-service USD banking products for crypto traders and related businesses. The attractive side is the financial solutions offered by this bank are fully insured. Among key services include USD accounts for crypto companies, fully insured USD deposits, and Crypto backed lending.
Revolut
This is a banking services institution in the UK. It allows individuals and businesses to make transactions in cryptocurrencies using their digital bank accounts. This institution supports users in the EEA region. The system is easy to use and offers a built-in cryptocurrency exchange.
More Countries Are Adopting Bitcoin and Other Cryptocurrencies
According to Chainalysis Global Crypto Adoption Index, more and more countries around the world are adopting cryptocurrency and this trend is rising as an obvious sign of the increase of cryptocurrency in fintech trends. Below is a chart that shows the countries adopting cryptocurrency.
As you can see, Vietnam, India, and Pakistan are leading the list with India leading in P2P exchange trade volume.
There is an obvious rise in the adoption of cryptocurrency as is seen from the chart below.
The chart shows that in the second quarter of 2021, the total score is 24. If you compare that with the data of 2019, the trend has gone up by 2300% and over 881% in the last year.
What can we infer from this data? The report predicts that cryptocurrency is going to be a truly global phenomenon taking the fact that it has skyrocketed in the last twelve months.
The question is will the US and China enter the game. The analysts say that so far they have no interest but as Wealth Crypto puts it “they want to be in charge of an experiment with potentially trillions of dollars in play”.
And cryptocurrency is moving steadily in the American economy whether you want it or not. In June 2021, NCR, an enterprise payments company, announced it was going to apply crypto solutions with 650 American banks. This future of cryptocurrency seems to take a more explicit look as this will change the way customers can spend their money.
Conclusion
In this article, we have shown that the future of cryptocurrency is promising. It is entering new spheres of the economy like non-profit and talent acquisition (that is to say education and career that affect ordinary people’s lives).
What is the role of cryptocurrency in fintech trends? The analyses and data show that more and more banks and countries are adopting cryptocurrency as a mode of transaction. However, the final say is with countries like the USA and China who are still resistant to take concrete action in the adoption of cryptocurrency. Crypto is skyrocketing in all other countries especially those in Asia.
