Sharpening skills in navigating the future of finance

This programme is designed to build the decision-making skills of senior executives in traditional and digital banks, technology companies, entrepreneurs, and founders of fintech firms as you navigate the future of finance. Interact with a team of highly experienced futurists, bankers, technologists, researchers and your peers as you build your own solid responses to the mega trends, technologies and geo-political realities that are transforming the industry today.

An investment in the programme includes a two-day MasterClass, one-day site visits, as well as a one-year membership to a community of like-minded peers, along with research data and insights, all accessible through an app. You will also have access to the faculty and your cohort for continued discussions. The course utilizes compelling case studies, data, and insights in simulations and discussions to crystallize your ideas. It also leverages your own experiences, which will be tested during the MasterClass, as well as through interviews in the course of the year.

You will be trained on utilizing all the core areas of basics of banking— balance sheet, capital, credit, products, risk and regulation, technologies, distribution channels, payments and related infrastructure—and tie them to the latest developments in platforms, tokens, wallets and decentralised finance. Develop your own responses to the metaverse in gaming and virtual reality, as well as artificial intelligence and machine learning. The program is designed to challenge your worldview and help you identify new scenarios as you shape your own future from a sound grounding in the first principles of banking. There is no other programme quite like it in the industry today.

The Programme

The Programme comprises a package of valuable deliverables for an entire year. You will get:

  • Two-day Programme (For details, refer to The Programme on page 3-4)
  • One year membership to The Future Bank Working Group (Refer to The Investment details on page 7)
  • Exercises to be completed in one year:
    • Recorded interview on your insights into the future of finance
    • Attend 2 of 4 quarterly chat sessions
  • One complimentary Study Tour of Innovations in Singapore (bonus)

MasterClass

Study Tour

Video and Voice Recordings

Monthly Updates

Peer and Consulting Support

Access to Third Party Content

THE PROGRAMME

09:00 – 10:00

Appreciating the conflict of diverse views

In this first session, we'll introduce ourselves and explore the diverse views and biases regarding the future of finance. Some participants support cryptocurrencies, while others do not, so the key takeaway is how to build consensus on shared challenges within your organization. Reading material will be available on the app, enabling you to gain new perspectives and navigate industry opinions towards a shared consensus.

10:00 – 11:00

From Silicon Valley Bank to Chat GPT – where are we heading?

In this session, we'll explore the current important trends in finance and analyze the failures of key banks in the US from a echnological and industry perspective. We'll focus on the impact of AI technologies, particularly Generative Pre-Trained Transformers like ChatGPTs, and their applications in banking. The session aims to enhance your ability to understand and navigate these trends, informing your decision-making processes.

11:00 – 12:00

A study of the most and least successful digital banks in the world

A deep dive into the reasons for success and failure of digital banks worldwide. A rich repository of strategic, operational and competitive issues that will be familiar to you. We will look at their products, the markets in which they serve and outline the trends that drive the industry. We will plot a SWOT analysis but with a focus on the future opportunities and threats that you need to be aware of for your own decisions.

12:00 – 13:00

Lunch

13:00 – 14:30

An urgent rethink of technology infrastructure and operational resilience

Discover how emerging technologies like NLPs, LLMs, and GPTs will reshape the future of technology architectures. Join us to explore operational resilience, cloud migration, digitalization, zero marginal cost theory, and personalization platforms. The sessuib will also uncover the potential of open-source computing, APIs, and user-developed applications in banking. Act now for a future-ready banking sector.

14:30 – 16:00

Payments, platforms and the impact of digital wallets

Payments, the forefront of disruption in banking, drives significant GDP growth in certain markets. Our study will examine payments from three perspectives: platforms enabling payment ideas, the evolution of digital wallets, and the future of payments in the metaverse. We'll explore global developments and distill future-looking strategies tailored to your marketplace.

16:00 – 17:30

Internalizing the principles of decentralised finance

In this session, we'll explore global happenings in blockchains, cryptocurrencies, and the metaverse to distinguish fact from fiction. Next, we'll identify decentralised finance principles relevant to traditional banking. Thirdly, we will juxtapose the best practices in decentralised finance against traditional finance and figure out how to navigate our respective responses.


09:00 – 10:30

Optimum organisational structure in a digital world

In this session, we discuss the different ways in which banks and bank holding companies are structured today, along with the challenges they face at both the business and infrastructure levels. We contrast legacy organisations with new-age disruptors to outline how organisations can leverage the digital dividend in finance. Additionally, we explore the positioning and interactions of different businesses. We will also address resistance to digitalisation from functional groups such as risk and compliance. Once again, we distill the session down to a sense of the most optimum structure that can work for your organisation.

10:30 – 12:00

The board, the regulator and applying for a digital banking license

Based on our faculty’s experience in applying for digital banking licences in different jurisdictions, this session is designed to outline the relationship with regulators. It starts with an overview of regulatory regimes globally and the issues regulators are most concerned about.

12:00 – 13:00

Lunch

13:00 – 14:30

Talent management and investing in innovation and disruptive changes

How does a bank mobilise its people to take on the innovation journey? Where in a bank should investments in innovation sit? What are the different ways a bank can invest in innovation in their respective markets, and how can a bank onboard these innovations?

14:30 – 16:00

Integrated risk in a digital business – credit, operation and funding

After discussing organisational structures, we zero in on the ability of the institution to manage the three areas of risk—what does it mean to take on an integrated approach to risk? We also discuss the role of the treasurer in a digital world. We discuss how asset and liability management (ALM), funds-transfer pricing, and other treasury functions are ripe for a revolution. We also look at environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals and examine how the products may have to change in the light of new digital challenges.

16:00 – 17:30

Sustainable strategies in a changing world

We conclude the programme by presenting strategies for various marketplace realities. Participants will also be required to personalise strategies applicable to their respective institutions. We will challenge you to think transformationally – if the product does not change, nothing will change in finance. We want you to imagine what your own future products will look like. These will be documented and presented as a report to each participant within two weeks after the session.


Complimentary Site Visit (for the Singapore edition)

09:00 – 10:30

A briefing from the regulators

As a leading regulator in the world, the MAS has a robust regulatory framework, takes a proactive approach to regulation, uses risk-based supervision, and collaborates with other regulators internationally to develop common standards and best practices. The MAS's regulatory approach has been praised for its effectiveness, innovation, and pragmatism, making it a model for other countries to follow. We will visit MAS for a briefing on the ecosystem, incentives and regulations in place to develop Singapore as a financial center. There will be a lot of ground to cover.

10:30 – 12:00

A visit to a neo-digital bank

A visit to Grab headquarters for a briefing on its overall strategy in integrating financial services into its powerful regional platform.

12:00 – 13:00

Lunch

13:00 – 14:30

SC Ventures – the Global VC arm of Standard Chartered Bank

SC Ventures, which is the innovation arm of Standard Chartered, focuses on exploring and implementing new technologies and business models to improve banking services and customer experience. It operates globally and focuses on areas such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and cybersecurity. We will visit SC Ventures and observe the internal culture and the combination of skills that have been brought together to grow and scale its portfolio of investments.

14:30 – 16:00

A*STAR - Leading in research on AI, data analytics and cybersecurity

The Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) aims to drive and sustain world-class scientific researches and features a dynamic and interactive showcase of up-to-date innovations and prototypes. A visit to one of the foremost state-sponsored technology incubator centers in the world to receive a briefing on leading-edge Artificial Intelligence (AI) projects that are underway to understand how the engineers and scientists involved in these projects build their applications.

16:00 – 17:30

Building trust and empowering customers in the decentralized economy - Visit to Cake DeFi

Founded in 2019, Cake DeFi is a leading decentralized finance (DeFi) services provider in Southeast Asia, offering suite of financial services for cryptocurrency investors, including lending, staking, and trading. The company has more than 1 million retail users from over 190 countries and managing over $1 billion in customer assets. We will visit Cake DeFi for a briefing on how these disruptors actually work and how they are scaling their business models even during periods of a crypto winter.

*The proposed sites are subject to confirmation and change based on various factors.

Your Faculty

Thought leaders and highly experienced professionals with an intuitive understanding of the industry

Emmanuel Daniel
Emmanuel Daniel
Founder, The Asian Banker,
Wealth and Society
Wilson Chia
Wilson Chia
Banking Consultant/ Advisor
Axel Winter
Axel Winter
Chief Digital & Technology Officer,
Partner & Advisor
Christian Kapfer
Christian Kapfer
Research Director,
The Asian Banker

Who should attend this Programme?

This programme is designed for:

Board members and CEOs transitioning into digital finance

Digital bankers seeking market expansion

Fintech cofounders and entrepreneurs

Disruptors creating transformative finance solutions and services

Business, research and technology analysts

The Investment

USD6,000

Early bird discount (USD4800 before 15 August 2023)

The investment into this programme is USD6,000 for the first participating member from the same organization and includes:

  • 2-day Building the Future Bank Study Programme
  • Complimentary One-day Study Tour
  • 3 nights hotel accommodation
  • One year’s Membership to the Future Bank Working Group
    • Monthly updates
    • Supporting Research Data, Case Studies, Video Interviews, Video Presentations
    • Recordings of the sessions
    • Chat group with other members and links to third party sources
  • The “Certified Future Bank Strategist” Certificate

(upon successful attendance to two Group Chat sessions and one video interview in the year)

In house version

We are able to run an in-house version of this programme that is specific to your institution. This include both consulting and mentorship services. We will come prepared with an in-depth research and SWOT analysis on your institution and marketplace so that the programme will be totally tailored for the realities in your marketplace. The programme can be designed in the form of a training, or a workshop for your board members or senior managers. The deliverable will include a recommendation report at the end of the programme. Contact our programme manager who can discuss with you the objectives that your institution wishes to achieve and design a programme that best suits your needs.

Contact us to design a programme that best suits your need.

Register Today