After George Osborne’s speech yesterday at the Innovate Finance conference, Toby Lanyon COO at TradeRiver Finance, discusses the announcement of new legislation regarding alternative finance routes for SMEs and BitCoin’s future impact on global trade.
“The Chancellor’s positive comments regarding the UK’s ambitions to be the global centre of excellence for alternative finance technology are very welcome indeed.
“Arguably the most exciting thing to draw from the Chancellor’s speech at the launch of Innovate Finance, was the announcement that legislation will make banks refer applicants to alternative finance routes outside their bank, if the bank cannot provide funding. The aim is to get this on the statute book is to be applauded.
“An interesting by-product of such legislation is likely to be the provision of one or more “portals” within which SMEs will be able to search for appropriate alternative finance solutions.
“The Chancellor’s announcement that there will a review this Autumn into the benefits and threats posed by alternative currencies is interesting. Much has been made of the lack of transparency, volatility and other drawbacks for treasuries, regulators and legislators, but little has yet been said regarding some other facets of virtual currencies. There are aspects of the way in which, for example, BitCoins work which could have far-reaching benefits for financial transactions generally and which may just change radically the way some very large industries operate. For example, the potential benefits to global trade of a secure, transparent, trade-specific “currency” could be large for this multi-trillion dollar industry, reducing costs, risks and complexity to the benefit of us all.
“We can expect awareness and use of alternative finance solutions to grow quickly, benefitting immediately the SME sector and the country’s economy as a whole.”
