FinTech

You define what is (and what is not) FinTech. You will explore the key disruptions that led to the emergence of the current FinTech industry. You will then apply insights about disruption to the challenge facing your organization. In addition, you will explore some of the key players in the FinTech ecosystem and conduct a Porter's Five Forces analysis on a related product or service: one of your own organization's or another firm's offerings. You will then conduct a competitive market analysis of your own or another organization's market to help you anticipate potential areas of risk and opportunity.

The aim is to introduce candidates to a wide range of financial technologies. Although finance has always been at the forefront of technological innovation, the financial industry is changing rapidly as new technologies emerge. In the past, central governments and financial institutions have been at the forefront of innovation in finance. Today, firms and information technology professionals are at the forefront of innovation in the financial sector. Our aim is to show the genesis and use cases of technology.

DeFi, or Decentralized Finance, is a new technology where users interact as equals with algorithms or smart contracts, rather than through traditional intermediaries such as banks, brokerages or insurance companies. This technology has the potential to change finance as we know it. It addresses the key problems of traditional finance, such as lack of inclusion, inefficiency, opacity, centralised control and lack of interoperability. We will look at the historical development of DeFi and the problems it solves, the mechanics, supply, ownership, lending and swaps, as well as the underlying protocols associated with DeFi and analyze the key risks associated with the issues and regulations surrounding DeFi.

Since the inception of the Internet, programmers have been trying to figure out how to create a [digital] world in which people anywhere - even complete strangers - can safely and efficiently conduct direct transactions with each other. In essence, they're trying to recreate the cornerstone of civilization: an orderly system of accounting that allows people to trust each other's claims about what they own, what they owe, and what they're owed. For most of the digital age, this "trust" was mediated by third parties such as banks, governments, or trusted companies willing to guarantee that a transaction was valid and secure. But transactions through third parties are slow and expensive and cannot be verified by just anyone, opening the door to fraud and theft. You will learn about the mechanics of blockchain technology and how blockchain functions as a trusted third party, and practice articulating other transformative ways that blockchains can change the way business and interpersonal connections take place online.

Cryptography has existed for thousands of years and is now the foundation of digital communication. Most people rely on cryptography on a daily basis without knowing it; most popular messaging apps use encryption to ensure the security of messages between two people. Similarly, blockchain technology relies on cryptography to protect the identity of the sending and receiving parties, ensuring that all information and transactions are secure and legitimate. So to truly understand blockchain technology, you need to understand the basic principles of cryptography.

You will therefore learn about the basics of cryptography: how information has historically been concealed (encrypted) and revealed (decrypted) using mathematics. You will see how a message can be turned into a number and how this number can be encrypted and decrypted by two complete strangers. You'll try your hand at encrypting your own message to understand the basics of what makes a good encryption scheme. You'll then dive deeper into the specific type of cryptography used in blockchain technology - public key cryptography - and the promises and limitations it holds in performing the basic functions of blockchain.