Why Fintech Battles Ahead Are About More Than Banks

The field known as fintech was pioneered by startups dreaming of toppling financial giants and democratizing access to credit. But now many of those behemoths have joined in. JPMorgan Chase & Co. has a history running back to the days of Alexander Hamilton, but it’s also got 50,000 employees working on its technology. It’s not just banking giants getting in on the fun. Recent steps by Walmart Inc., the world’s largest retailer, to create a fintech division has sent shivers across Wall Street. In another sign of fintech’s maturity, regulators are doing as much to shape its progress as coders or dreamers. Take Ant Group Co.’s plans for a public offering in November that was projected to value the app, which moves money for 1.3 billion people, at about $280 billion. That was before the Chinese government stepped in and derailed the listing.

An effort to revolutionize financial services by extending them to smartphones and applying new technologies such as artificial intelligence. It encompasses a wide range of areas from mobile payments to cryptocurrencies. LendingClub Corp. helped create a new field of person-to-person lending, initially as a way to match up small investors and small borrowers, while services such as Betterment and Wealthfront sought to make wealth management accessible to more people through “robo-advisers,” portfolio management programs available for a fraction of what a human financial adviser might charge. Meanwhile, payment apps like Revolut in the U.K. made sending money overseas faster and cheaper.