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> The world’s financial systems are increasingly unable to meet the demands of consumers and businesses. I would love to learn more about this. Precisely what

> The world’s financial systems are increasingly unable to meet the demands of consumers and businesses. I would love to learn more about this. Precisely what needs are the world's financial systems unable to meet?

antoineMoPa 9y ago
I just read a blog post showing how costly and/or complicated it is to move money between countries, when doing internships for instance. I guess that's one problem that could be solved. https://medium.com/@emilefugulin/money-tips-for-foreigners-working-in-europe-a94211005c09 https://medium.com/@emilefugulin/money-tips-for-foreigners-w...
- pitchups 9y ago
  Isn't Ripple trying to do precisely that using the blockchain based XRP token?
  - simlevesque 9y ago
    They are.
jjeaff 9y ago
In my opinion, the main issue with many financial services today is heavy regulation. This may be good regulation and necessary, but it makes it very difficult for consumers to do simple things like transferring money and setup accounts. Especially for lower income people who tend to have difficulty getting together all the required identification and documentation. And it seems that any "innovation" in this regard will be companies attempting to skirt these regulations, only to be eventually reined in when they get popular enough to be used for fraud or other nefarious purposes.
- mstade 9y ago
  A story related to regulation that I like to tell people is my experience trying to open a UK bank account when I first moved there. As an EU citizen, I expected the process to be done in jiffy – just walk in to any ol’ bank and ask to open an account. Except, my EU passport and an employment contract that said I’d certainly not be poor and national insurance number and what not apparently meant nothing. No, I had to have a UK address. The apartment hotel I stayed at while trying to find an apartment wouldn’t do either – I needed utility bills you see. (For some reason, utility bills in the UK are basically as good for identification as a passport or drivers license...) In order to get a utility bill of course I had to have a place to live, an apartment or house or what have you. Of course, I couldn’t sign a lease without also setting up a standing order (that’s monthly payments, for anyone as unfamiliar with the term as I was) and of course I couldn’t set up a standing order because to do so I had to have a – you guessed it! – bank account. A catch-22 which means to this day I keep a UK bank account, just to avoid the hassle of trying to set one up should I ever need it again.
  - sjg007 9y ago
    Can't you have a dual currency bank account (e.g. a pound sterling side and a euro side) from your EU country and then pay from that? Or maybe there's some reason that won't work..
  - user5994461 9y ago
    Depends on what employee you got an appointment with. Try the next bank if the first one was an asshole. You have more than enough documentation.
  - afarrell 9y ago
    Moving there from the US, I am so grateful that someone warned me about this ahead of time and told me to go to Lloyds bank. I think Transferwise now allows you to sign up for a borderless account that has UK-local bank details.
- dgudkov 9y ago
  >In my opinion, the main issue with many financial services today is heavy regulation. Money (which is the root of finance) is incredibly strong stimulus for humans that evokes all kinds of human vices. Sooner or later, anything that deals with finance and mine will come down to the questions of human nature and morale. And these are tough matters to deal with.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  The solution to this is simple: allow the USPS to offer banking services to the unbanked. This is what other first world countries do, but for political reasons, we don't do it in the US [1]. Financial regulation is not going away, and the issues you see with cryptocurrency make it glaringly obvious why regulations exist in the first place. That's what's so discouraging about a lot of these issues. They're hacks around political apathy, the chances of success are low (to this day I still use the Standard Treasury and BankSimple outcomes as what happens when you go up against the banking industry). Why YC doesn't stop skirting the issue and align with political representatives and parties that are congruent with the values they're attempting to push through funding is beyond me. They've already chosen a side (looking for solutions for climate change, animal welfare, support of the arts/creators, sustainable use of planetary resources), embrace it fully. If YC wants to create a legacy, they should aim to obsolete themselves by working towards public policy that removes the risk inherant with becoming an entrepreneur (funding, health insurance, derisking opportunity cost, etc). [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=usps+banking+services https://www.google.com/search?q=usps+banking+services [1a] https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/bernie-sanders-lets-turn-post-offices-into-banks/411589/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/bernie-... Full disclosure: I work for a financial utility in risk management.
  - peacetreefrog 9y ago
    The USPS lost $2.7B last year, even though it has a monopoly on mail. Why anyone would want to give it more responsibility is beyond me.
    - mschuster91 9y ago
      > The USPS lost $2.7B last year, why anyone would want to give it more responsibility is beyond me. The loss comes from having to serve literally the entire country by law. A postal service in cities is profitable - a postal service that has to serve even the remotest ditch in the deepest desert of a flyover state with daily mail will always incur loss. And that is what society is for: to bear the cost of providing everyone in the country with affordable mail. To add banking services to the unbanked (or those who do not trust the megabanks any more, given their historic lack of customer support and historically low image) is something that can very well be used to offset these losses.

antoineMoPa 9y ago

I just read a blog post showing how costly and/or complicated it is to move money between countries, when doing internships for instance. I guess that's one problem that could be solved. https://medium.com/@emilefugulin/money-tips-for-foreigners-working-in-europe-a94211005c09 https://medium.com/@emilefugulin/money-tips-for-foreigners-w...

pitchups 9y ago
Isn't Ripple trying to do precisely that using the blockchain based XRP token?
- simlevesque 9y ago
  They are.

jjeaff 9y ago

In my opinion, the main issue with many financial services today is heavy regulation. This may be good regulation and necessary, but it makes it very difficult for consumers to do simple things like transferring money and setup accounts. Especially for lower income people who tend to have difficulty getting together all the required identification and documentation. And it seems that any "innovation" in this regard will be companies attempting to skirt these regulations, only to be eventually reined in when they get popular enough to be used for fraud or other nefarious purposes.

mstade 9y ago
A story related to regulation that I like to tell people is my experience trying to open a UK bank account when I first moved there. As an EU citizen, I expected the process to be done in jiffy – just walk in to any ol’ bank and ask to open an account. Except, my EU passport and an employment contract that said I’d certainly not be poor and national insurance number and what not apparently meant nothing. No, I had to have a UK address. The apartment hotel I stayed at while trying to find an apartment wouldn’t do either – I needed utility bills you see. (For some reason, utility bills in the UK are basically as good for identification as a passport or drivers license...) In order to get a utility bill of course I had to have a place to live, an apartment or house or what have you. Of course, I couldn’t sign a lease without also setting up a standing order (that’s monthly payments, for anyone as unfamiliar with the term as I was) and of course I couldn’t set up a standing order because to do so I had to have a – you guessed it! – bank account. A catch-22 which means to this day I keep a UK bank account, just to avoid the hassle of trying to set one up should I ever need it again.
- sjg007 9y ago
  Can't you have a dual currency bank account (e.g. a pound sterling side and a euro side) from your EU country and then pay from that? Or maybe there's some reason that won't work..
- user5994461 9y ago
  Depends on what employee you got an appointment with. Try the next bank if the first one was an asshole. You have more than enough documentation.
- afarrell 9y ago
  Moving there from the US, I am so grateful that someone warned me about this ahead of time and told me to go to Lloyds bank. I think Transferwise now allows you to sign up for a borderless account that has UK-local bank details.
dgudkov 9y ago
>In my opinion, the main issue with many financial services today is heavy regulation. Money (which is the root of finance) is incredibly strong stimulus for humans that evokes all kinds of human vices. Sooner or later, anything that deals with finance and mine will come down to the questions of human nature and morale. And these are tough matters to deal with.
toomuchtodo 9y ago
The solution to this is simple: allow the USPS to offer banking services to the unbanked. This is what other first world countries do, but for political reasons, we don't do it in the US [1]. Financial regulation is not going away, and the issues you see with cryptocurrency make it glaringly obvious why regulations exist in the first place. That's what's so discouraging about a lot of these issues. They're hacks around political apathy, the chances of success are low (to this day I still use the Standard Treasury and BankSimple outcomes as what happens when you go up against the banking industry). Why YC doesn't stop skirting the issue and align with political representatives and parties that are congruent with the values they're attempting to push through funding is beyond me. They've already chosen a side (looking for solutions for climate change, animal welfare, support of the arts/creators, sustainable use of planetary resources), embrace it fully. If YC wants to create a legacy, they should aim to obsolete themselves by working towards public policy that removes the risk inherant with becoming an entrepreneur (funding, health insurance, derisking opportunity cost, etc). [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=usps+banking+services https://www.google.com/search?q=usps+banking+services [1a] https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/bernie-sanders-lets-turn-post-offices-into-banks/411589/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/bernie-... Full disclosure: I work for a financial utility in risk management.
- peacetreefrog 9y ago
  The USPS lost $2.7B last year, even though it has a monopoly on mail. Why anyone would want to give it more responsibility is beyond me.
  - mschuster91 9y ago
    > The USPS lost $2.7B last year, why anyone would want to give it more responsibility is beyond me. The loss comes from having to serve literally the entire country by law. A postal service in cities is profitable - a postal service that has to serve even the remotest ditch in the deepest desert of a flyover state with daily mail will always incur loss. And that is what society is for: to bear the cost of providing everyone in the country with affordable mail. To add banking services to the unbanked (or those who do not trust the megabanks any more, given their historic lack of customer support and historically low image) is something that can very well be used to offset these losses.