SET Training - Banking and Fintech

By Stanley Epstein – We tap a card, wave a phone, or click a button, and money moves. This process has become so seamless, so integrated into our daily lives, that it's easy to overlook the colossal system working behind the scenes. But this seamless experience masks a tectonic shift. The very architecture of global finance is fracturing and re-forming, and the 2025 McKinsey Global Payments Report reveals a series of surprising shifts that will affect not just banks and tech companies, but everyone with a digital wallet. Here are the four most impactful truths from the report that are shaping the future of money. 1. The Hype is Over: Global Payments Growth is Hitting a Wall After a period of supercharged expansion, the global payments industry is experiencing a significant slowdown. While revenue surged by an impressive 12% in 2023, growth fell sharply to just 4% in 2024. According to the report, this deceleration is caused by four distinct factors: peaking interest rates, a more ...

Introduction: The Hidden Cost of a Cashless Future The advance of digital currencies is often presented as the next logical step in financial convenience—a seamless, efficient future. But what if this digital evolution comes with a hidden, non-negotiable price—our personal freedom? This article exposes four truths about Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), using the words of their own proponents to reveal an agenda not of convenience, but of absolute, programmable control. 1. Your Money Will No Longer Be Yours—It Will Be "Programmable" The core innovation of a CBDC is the concept of "programmable money." This means a central authority, such as a government or central bank, would have the ability to place rules, restrictions, and conditions directly onto your funds. Your money would no longer be a neutral tool for exchange but a permission-based token controlled by the state. This technology transforms personal assets into a state-managed voucher system. It could...

Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) are under fire in a new Gatestone Institute article, warning that they threaten personal and economic freedom. Economist Richard A. Werner calls CBDCs a 'digital prison', enabling totalitarian control over spending. With the EU pushing a Euro CBDC and concerns raised by the Bank for International Settlements’ Agustin Carstens about 'absolute control,' fears of abuse grow, pointing to Canada’s trucker account freezes as a chilling example. In the U.S., efforts by President Trump and the House aim to ban CBDCs, as the article argues they’re a globalist step toward unprecedented power and suppression of dissent."

- Stanley Epstein -   Introduction The common narrative around digital payments is one of solved problems and inevitable progress. We hear about a future that is instant, seamless, and entirely digital, and it’s easy to assume the financial industry is well on its way to delivering it. But a recent deep-dive into the state of the global payments ecosystem reveals a far more complex and surprising reality. These insights come from the "Payments 2030: What’s Shaping the Future?" report, based on a June 2025 survey of 162 senior financial executives conducted by Finextra Research in partnership with ACI Worldwide. The report uncovers the high-stakes conflict at the heart of the industry: the immense external pressure of customer demand crashing against the powerful internal inertia of legacy systems and reactive culture. This post distils the five most impactful takeaways from the report. They are not just interesting facts; they are crucial pieces of evidence that paint a pictu...

Introduction: Beyond the Banks Stanley Epstein - When we think of the 2008 Great Financial Crisis, the story that comes to mind is one of failing banks, risky mortgages, and a system brought to its knees by the very institutions meant to be its bedrock. It was, in the popular imagination and in reality, a “banking crisis.” But in the years since, the global financial system has undergone a series of profound structural changes that are less visible to the public but are every bit as important. This isn’t just a story about stricter bank regulations. It’s about how the fundamental ways money moves around the world have been completely reconfigured. It’s a story about how the demand for “safe” government debt, fuelled by your pension fund, created a gargantuan “hidden” market that now transmits financial shocks in ways we’ve never seen before—challenging the very power of central banks. This article reveals four of the most impactful and surprising shifts that define our modern financial...

By Stanley Epstein -  Introduction: More Than Just a Digital Nuisance When a cyberattack brought production at Asahi, one of Japan’s largest brewers, to a halt, the consequences were felt in local beer halls running out of popular lagers. Similarly, when hackers struck carmaker Jaguar Land Rover, assembly lines fell silent, costing the company millions per week. These incidents reveal a critical truth: cybercrime is no longer an abstract IT problem. It is a tangible force that can halt manufacturing, disrupt supply chains, and affect the availability of everyday consumer goods. While carried out by different criminal groups, many of these disruptive attacks share a common feature: the use of ransomware to paralyse a business and extort payment. The threat has evolved in sophisticated and surprising ways, and this article explores the most impactful new realities of the modern cybercrime landscape. Takeaway 1: Your Boss Is Calling—Or Is It? The Rise of AI-Powered Deception Artifici...

Introduction: The "White Elephant" in the Room For any manager tasked with monthly reporting, the process is painfully familiar: hours spent pulling data from disparate sources, struggling to create a connected view, only to produce a static report that's outdated the moment it's finished. In response, organizations have built countless dashboards promising a real-time, data-driven view into every corner of the business. Yet, many of these meticulously crafted tools end up as digital "white elephants"—expensive assets that consume time and money but sit unused, providing little to no real value. The core problem isn't the technology, the choice of chart, or the color scheme. The difference between a high-value dashboard and a digital paperweight lies in the strategic framework behind it. A dashboard's success begins long before the first line of code is written and continues long after it has been launched. There are five counter-intuitive but critic...