Our inaugural in-person ‘Lab’ event in Estonia and webinars on hot topics including open banking, fused with our drumbeat of independent editorial content on ‘government fintech’ developments across the globe, add up to a memorable 2022.
Global Government Fintech, launched almost two-and-a-half years ago as a dedicated sister publication to Global Government Forum, reports on and analyses public authority-led fintech developments around the world, building an audience of public sector professionals who are interested in – and increasingly investing in – fintech.
UK HM Revenue & Customs’ extension of its pioneering use of open banking and the Bahamas ‘Sand Dollar’ central bank digital currency achieving its second anniversary are two cases of fintech solutions in public use. “The breadth and depth of public authorities’ explorations and experimentation with fintech solutions is increasing all the time, as is the number of ‘live’ projects: it’s fascinating to track and report on how these projects evolve,” said Global Government Fintech editor Ian Hall.
“We have covered initiatives from the Isle of Man to Eswatini in the past few weeks,” Hall said. “These two examples alone illustrate how 2022 has seen government agencies and central banks in all corners of the globe exploring the possibilities of fintech and digital money.”
Partnerships between public authorities and the private sector also form (an often integral) part of the narrative. In the past few weeks alone, for example, we have reported on the European Central Bank (ECB) inking contracts with five consultancies for digital euro support (doubling the total number of companies directly involved in the project to ten); and the European Investment Bank issuing a €100m digital bond on a private blockchain. Articles from Australia to Canada, meanwhile, have illustrated governments’ role as an enabler of fintech through frameworks and regulation: an increasingly busy – and inevitably controversial – field.
Bringing global fintech leaders together
The Global Government Fintech Lab, which was hosted by the Government of Estonia, saw us unleashed from the international travel restrictions necessitated by Covid-19 to convene senior global government fintech representatives in Tallinn in June. Estonia’s finance minister Keit Pentus-Rosimannus delivered the opening keynote.
Global Government Fintech webinars during the year examined cross-cutting questions including ‘Keeping track of fintech: how should governments measure fintech’s growing importance?’ and ‘Fintech and the future: where is the greatest potential for central governments’ use of fintech solutions?’; as well as topic-specific questions such as ‘Open banking and open finance: what role – and benefits – for governments?’; ‘How can “green fintech” help tackle climate change?’; ‘How can AI help public authorities save money and deliver better outcomes?’; and ‘Government fintech adoption: what role for digital identity?’.
“As we have continued to build our audience for our news, interviews and analysis, it has been fantastic to bring senior leaders together in-person and online this year as we look to increase our engagement with the global government fintech community,” said publisher Kevin Sorkin. “I’d like to thank commercial partners including AWS, IBM, Mastercard, Microsoft and Quantexa for their support, as well as our first Lab’s fintech showcase partners Bankish and Salv.”
Details of the next Global Government Fintech Lab will be revealed shortly. Details of Global Government Fintech’s 2023 webinar programme are already available.
If you would like to find out how you can support us commercially, please contact info@globalgovernmentfintech.com. You can also join our growing community on LinkedIn and Twitter – and spread the word about our free weekly email newsletter.
TOP TEN: 2022’s MOST POPULAR ARTICLES
1st: Global Government Fintech Lab 2022 – almost inevitably, it was the build-up to/coverage of our inaugural in-person event that got you clicking most this year
2nd: Nepal adopts India’s UPI payments platform – our news story (16 March 2022) on the international arm of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI)’s announcement that it was to partner two companies to roll out its Unified Payment Interface (UPI) in its mountainous neighbouring nation
3rd: BIS Innovation Hub London head outlines centre’s first two projects – our news story (29 March 2022) on the inaugural head of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub’s London office, Francesca Hopwood Road, presenting details of the centre’s first two projects (‘Project Meridian’ and ‘Project Rosalind’)
4th: Philippines presents three-year open finance strategy – our news story (16 January 2022) on Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’s ‘Open Finance Roadmap 2021-2024’
5th : How is fintech being used in government and the public sector? – our explainer on public authorities’ growing interest and investment in fintech solutions
6th: HMRC extends open banking payments to nine further tax regimes – our news story (11 January 2022) on the UK’s HM Revenue & Customs extending its use of open banking to nine further tax regimes, including tax levied on property purchases (stamp duty), capital gains tax and gambling duties (further updates followed during the year: for example, ‘HMRC open banking rollout takes in 24 more tax types‘ on 30 August)
7th: Private-sector CBDC activity cranks up in UK – this UK-focused news story (19 August 2022) on central bank digital currency (CBDC) development (which is one of the most vibrant areas of government- and fintech-related activity) looked at initiatives backed by big names in technology and banking including IBM and Barclays
8th: Open banking case study for tax payments – our case study (published on 15 February 2022) on how the UK government is pioneering the use of open banking to collect tax payments (the article is set out as ‘Challenge’, ‘Solution’, ‘Results’ and ‘Global Government Fintech verdict’)
9th: Pakistan to launch digital ID wallet this year – our news story (8 March 2022) on an initiative by Pakistan’s National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA)
10th: Norway progresses CBDC tech explorations – our news story (13 September 2022) on Norges Bank progressing its digital currency technical explorations, having made the source code for a Norwegian CBDC sandbox publicly available and started working with two companies on developing ‘test cases’
Pre-2022 editorial content continuing to prove popular included:
* One small website button, one giant leap for payments to government? – our analysis (6 April 2021) of UK HMRC’s apparent global first (a government using open banking technology to take tax payments)
* HMRC reaches milestone as £1bn in UK tax paid through open banking – a further UK open banking-related news story (29 September 2021)
* South Korea launches government-backed consumer finance data service – our news story (14 December 2021) on South Korea’s Financial Services Commission running a one-month pilot of ‘MyData’, a government-led programme aiming to give citizens the ability to manage personal financial data from different financial institutions on one platform
