Key takeaways from this spring's IFGS and FinCrime Fest

April 14, 2022.

Springtime in London is beautiful for several reasons: boat races, flower shows and FinTech events happening every week (let us have our fun, we’ve been bored of a stay-at-home work brought by the pandemic for quite a long time). Our MLRO Ilda Soares and Head of Finance Alex Goba attended some of them at the beginning of this month and shared their professional impressions.

Key takeaways from this spring's IFGS and FinCrime Fest

Springtime in London is beautiful for several reasons: boat races, flower shows and FinTech events happening every week (let us have our fun, we’ve been bored of a stay-at-home work brought by the pandemic for quite a long time). Our MLRO Ilda Soares and Head of Finance Alex Goba attended some of them at the beginning of this month and shared their professional impressions.

FinCrime Festival organised by Transform Finance

Don’t disregard whistleblowing – Ilda Soares, MLRO at MultiPass

“I really enjoyed the Festival, it was rich with ideas that compliance officers might find quite useful. But if you ask me to play favourites, it would be the session on whistleblowing, led by Natalie Sookhoo, the CCO Investigations and Anti-Fraud at Credit Suisse. I say that this practice that is old as the hills is overshadowed by modern trends and does not get enough focus in the world of payment institutions.

The essence of whistleblowing is giving your employees, customers or partners a safe, anonymous way of sharing information about potential breaches of law or internal policies. In our digitalised world, where remote services and application processes gain more ground every day, identity fraud is a rising concern and we should not disregard this strong tool in the battle against financial crimes. Having a clear whistleblowing framework in 2022 is still a must: each FinTech should invest time in educating staff and organise trainings that encourage employees to report their concerns and for colleagues in risk management roles to escalate these concerns correctly.”

IFGS by Innovate Finance

Blockchain is still a strategic priority to UK regulator – Alex Goba, Head of Finance at MultiPass

“The central topic of this year’s IFGS was crypto, and everything related (still there, still blowing regulators’ minds). The discussions revolved around legislation challenges, the planned validation of stablecoins as a regulated means of payment, and the intended support of the FinTech industry players dealing with DLT and tokenisation.

I always believed that blockchain tech itself has a huge potential. Needless to say, the United Kingdom is determined to become the main crypto hub and harvest the fruits of this emerging technology. As a UK-based bank challenger, MultiPass has a lot of interesting opportunities in this direction, and I personally am eager to see what the future brings to us.”