Tearsheet's inaugural Power of Payments conference is now in the books. Senior decision-makers at leading payments firms like Visa, Square, Amex, Wise, Goldman Sachs, Citi, and more gathered in New York City to talk about the challenges and opportunities ahead for the industry.
T-POP's morning keynotes included chats from Goldman Sachs' Luc Teboul (embedded payments), Wise's Roshni Joshi (evolution of cross-border payments), Visa's Darren Parslow (current trends in B2B), and Amex's Mohammed Badi (the role of networks). We then broke into roundtables, off the record discussions around some of the biggest issues the industry is facing – things like embedded payments and what it really means to build a platform business, preparing for a world of real-time payments, and identifying, recruiting, and managing top payments talent.
Participants from each roundtable took to the stage to provide their team's feedback on the issues. It's truly magical when people from different companies – sometimes, even direct competitors – can discuss these issues in an honest way outside the four walls of their firms.
After lunch, we had Citi's Anupam Sinha (intersection of commerce and treasury), Quavo's Brittany Usher (automation overcoming human capital volatility), Square's Anusha Ramanujam (embedding financial services into payments), and Marqeta's Shannon Johnson (modern payments and flexibility to FIs).
In our discussion throughout the day, we heard a lot about the challenges and opportunities as we move into the next generation of payments.
Challenges
- Domestic payment systems mean customers use patchwork of payments internationally (Roshni Joshi, Wise)
- How to keep technology platforms consistent and be able to provide something differentiated to partners (Luc Teboul, Goldman Sachs)
- Same issues that dogged the industry 20 years ago are challenges today (Darren Parslow, Visa)
- RTP and FedNow won’t support cross-border use cases (Roshni Joshi, Wise)
- Table stakes to have virtual card capabilities going forward – largest transformation on the horizon (Darren Parslow, Visa)
- How to work with fintechs on integrating with large, incumbent businesses? Issuer processors. (Mohammed Badi, Amex)
- Real-time notifications are critical and make for real experiences when you’re facing consumers (Anupam Sinha, Citi)
- No matter where we sit in the industry, we’re all looking to ensure that we’re reducing losses and avoiding regulators (Brittany Usher, Quavo)
- ‘Our bankers love their customers more than the bank they work for’ but free banking was funded by non-sufficient funds fees (Shannon Johnson, Marqeta)
Opportunities
- Embedded finance is at an inflection point (Luc Teboul, Goldman Sachs)
- Instant, convenient, transparent and low-cost international payments (Roshni Joshi, Wise)
- Emerging B2B marketplace ecosystem in an opportunity for partner and provider (Luc Teboul, Goldman Sachs)
- Card network + acquiring business creates opportunities to make more money (Mohammed Badi, Amex)
- Payments as an experience to driving experience through embedded is where things are headed (Anupam Sinha, Citi)
- 32% of Square loans went to people of color – by connecting payments with financial services, you can create great experiences (Anusha Ramanujam, Square)
- Government use case is humongous – think of the unlock of government use case on an embedded payments platform – could dwarf everything (Darren Parslow, Visa)
- 73% of consumers, 65% of SMBs use apps for cross-border transactions (Roshni Joshi, Wise)
- Opportunities for experiences for cardholders is plus ultra (Mohammed Badi, Amex)
- Because we have information about our SMB clients, we can proactively make a loan offer and have a part of each sale go to paying off the loan (Anusha Ramanujam, Square)
- Neobanks are purpose-driven and obsessive about making good on their customers’ experiences (Shannon Johnson, Marqeta)
As attendees assimilate the nature and content of our discussions, Tearsheet is kicking off its next conference – The Big Bank Theory – to be held in Miami Beach, December 8, 2022. Hope you'll join us.