“Commonwealth Bank chief executive, Ian Narev, is the first banker to spill his mental load on the prospect of tech firms deeply disrupting the financial services sector,” Jonny Evans reports for Computerworld. “Speaking at the G100 Congress in Sydney this morning, Narev observed that accelerating network speeds and the rapid evolution of smartphone apps is already changing the industry — but he anticipates even bigger threats in future.”
“‘We consider we have got very, very good competitors in the major banks, we have got very good competitors in the next tier banks,’ he said. However, he isn’t just worried about other banks, but also technology firms who are already cash-rich and international,” Evans reports. “‘The Apples, the Googles, the Samsungs, the Paypals, the credit card companies, who can pick particular slivers as a result of the application of technology into financial services and compete,’ he said. ‘”We need to be prepared for that.'”
Evans reports, His warning may sound a little preposterous: after all, can Apple really become a bank? Possibly… Apple already has over 400 million active iTunes accounts worldwide, each one linked to a credit card.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: Actually, as of January, Apple had over 500 million active iTunes accounts linked to credit cards. Half a billion and counting!