My largest holdings are card networks, and I’m very keen on their continued growth and sustainability of competitive advantage. My confidence is based on five broad themes.
Winning in Network of Networks: Collaboration
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Category Archives: Data
Networks, Value Assembly and Organizational Structures
Bull Case For Visa and Mastercard
Very Long Blog. 4 Page Exec Summary. Feedback appreciated. This blog has been my “blocker” as I’ve iterated over the last 7 months. I’ve thinned this down from 31 pages (which no one would read) to 23. No I will never write something this big again.
The thoughts below are an update to my 2016 Small Wins, where I outlined how the forces that have driven scale, and shaped organizations, are atrophying (Transaction Cost Economics, asset intensity, information intensity, finance… etc). Paul Graham’s calls this change Refragmentation, I call it Transformation of Networks.
It’s as if the gravitational constant (the big G) is changing and new forces are driving the formation of new networks influenced by a rapidly evolving world of “weak links”. Information intensity has moved beyond “tweaking” 100 yr old business models to transform the design of industries, communities and people.
Whereas the 2016 blog was more about the “possibilities” enabled by tech, this blog is about the reality of how things will evolve.
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Plaid fights for relevance
Side note. I have 4 blogs just about ready to go in the next week.
- Value Structures and Organizational Models. This one has been in the works too long and has backed everything else up
- V/MA – Break out growth opportunities (still my largest holdings).
- Updated view on alternate payment schemes
- Banks and “owning identity”. Ownership and control is not the problem. Getting others to value their role and rules is.
Bank Transformation – Actions for Banks to Succeed in the Storm of Disruption
A Framework for Collaboration – Taking Part in Consumer Journeys
16 Page Blog – 3 Page Exec Summary
Part 2 of Future of Retail Banking (2023). This blog has been sitting at 60% for 2 months now. Sorry for the delay. A bull case for V/MA and service expansion.
A storm is brewing that will dwarf the impact the internet (V1/V2) had on established business models. There are multiple transformations occurring simultaneously: AI/ML, Web3, Digital ID, DLT, open mandates, FinTech, Wallets, ….etc. (see Web3 and Small Wins). While large orchestrators and big tech dominate today due to their virtuous cycles, new forces push for the “break up” of Big Tech and centralized data stores to make the internet more democratic and more privacy friendly.
Open Banking in US – Quick Take CPFB Proposed Rule
Before listening to anyone on this topic its important to get a feeling for experience. I’ve been fortunate to run two of the largest online banks: Citi and Wachovia. Wachovia was the very first customer of Yodlee (1999), a service our customers loved. My banks were also scraped endlessly, representing over 30% of our traffic and 20% of our call center complaints. We were also the largest PFM bank (think MS Money and Quicken), keeping our OFX servers up and running was key. After my banking life I spent time rearchitecting payment data flows from point of sale to payment at Google. Then spent 8 years creating Commerce Signals, a payment data business.
CPFB’s Proposed Rule
Consumer Data Bureau?
Short blog today as opposed to the 9 page monster in identity and attribution Friday. Today I’m providing my thoughts on what a consumer data bureau would look like. Summary: Banks have a unique opportunity to create a consumer data bureau and be the key “switch” for regulated and permissioned data. Will they seize it?
Per blog yesterday, everyone has a partial view of you based upon their observations and what you trust them to hold (see Payments and Observer Effect). The more often you interact with a single entity, the more they learn about you. Today Google and Amazon know you much better than your bank. Any unique insights that a bank may have is limited by their ability to take part in that transaction. Thus entities, with the ability to initiate transactions, have the most control (summary of Identity will Define Future of Trust Blog).
Incentives – How will Visa Amazon Play Out?
I outlined the Visa Amazon dispute in my blog 4 weeks ago. Today, Visa is confidently projecting it can bring the issue to a close. For the exec team to communicate confidence, my presumption is that they have both a primary strategy and a fall back strategy. Given that the big players influence payments so heavily, let me lay out a few scenarios on how this could wrap up.
Plaid – Quick Take
I’m back to blogging after a successful exit last month. The Plaid acquisition is a great way for me to jump back in. Why read this? A key to understanding payments, banking and data is to balance historical knowledge with a network of people that know what is really happening behind the scenes. As the former head of two direct banks, former Senior Director of Oracle’s advanced technology solution’s practice and Yodlee’s first customer I have an informed perspective on the market for this one.