Hamish Monk - Community Author: Finextra Research

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is Verification of Payee?

Verification of Payee (VoP) is a pre-payment security measure which confirms whether a payment recipient’s name matches the bank account details provided by the payer, before a transaction is executed. Not to be confused with Confirmation of Payee (CoP) – which performs a similar function, though specific to the United Kingdom and introduced by P...

16 September 2025 /regulation

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What are social engineering scams?

Social engineering is the next cybersecurity battleground. In August 2025 alone, social engineering and multi-chain attacks drove a 15% crypto hack spike – with $163 million lost across 16 major breaches, targeting exchanges, DeFi protocols, and individual users. According to the on-chain sleuth ZachXBT, one investor lost 783 Bitcoin, worth $91 mi...

08 September 2025 /crime

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is blockchain?

Since its ideation over 30 years ago, blockchain’s use by the private and public sector has grown exponentially. In August 2025, Bloomberg reported that the United States had put its gross domestic product (GDP) data on blockchain, marking yet another foray by President Trump into the world of crypto. Google Cloud, meanwhile, is said to be develo...

02 September 2025 /crypto

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is boss-tech?

Accountancy firm PwC has launched a biometric-based “traffic light system” in its offices, enabling managers to digitally track employees’ attendance. Such measures – known as ‘boss-tech’ – are part of a rising tide of in-house biometric deployment by institutions within the UK financial services industry. But here’s the contention: Is boss-tech ...

19 August 2025 /identity

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What are sustainable securities?

In recent years the shores of sustainable finance have been battered by the choppy waters of geopolitics. Despite a surge in growth, public interest, and market momentum between 2020 and 2022 (a result of progressive policy, disclosure frameworks, and an explosion in environmental, social and governance [ESG] investment products) sustainable finan...

12 August 2025 /sustainable

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is supply chain finance?

Supply chain finance (SCF) – also known as reverse factoring – was birthed by globalisation and the increasingly complex, multi-party supply chains that enable it. While the use of SCF necessarily fluctuates in line with the health of the geopolitical landscape (as well as the shifting weight of regulatory and reporting requirements) it will remai...

05 August 2025 /wholesale

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is treasury technology?

According to PwC’s 2025 Global Treasury Survey, in today’s volatile “macroeconomic environment, a ‘cash-first’ operating model is no longer optional. Treasury must lead with forecasting accuracy, real-time visibility and centralised control.” The only effective means for organisations to achieve these goals – as well as weather the headwinds of st...

29 July 2025 /ai

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What are embedded payments?

Embedded payments are a type of embedded finance, whereby financial services are extended within non-financial contexts. In such a scenario, the business-to-customer (B2C) firm stands as an intermediary between the customer and the financial institution (FI) – meaning the bank is (superficially) removed from the banking process. While this is not...

22 July 2025 /payments

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is robo advice?

Robo advice in the context of the financial services industry refers to automated investment advice available around-the-clock, over the internet. The process typically begins with an information gathering phase – often in the form of an online questionnaire – before which investments are automatically executed on behalf of the client, based on th...

08 July 2025 /wealth

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

What is predictive analysis?

Predictive analytics is a method of data analysis used within the financial services industry – and beyond – to forecast business-related outcomes. It sits on a spectrum, beginning with descriptive analytics, the most basic form of data analysis, then moving to diagnostic analytics, predictive analytics, and finally prescriptive analytics – the mo...

01 July 2025 /ai

Mounting geopolitical tensions underscore the need for public cloud diversification

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

Mounting geopolitical tensions underscore the need for public cloud diversification

Today’s industrial revolution, also known as Industry 4.0, is characterised by smart systems, artificial intelligence (AI), internet of things (IoT), advanced robotics, and automation. If these innovations are the locomotives of Industry 4.0, then their fuel is data. Be it customer behaviour, engagement, attitudes, or personal information, data – ...

24 June 2025 /cloud

To ESG or not to ESG? Britain’s ‘Big Four’ banks buck the trend of DEI retreat

Hamish Monk Senior Reporter at Finextra

To ESG or not to ESG? Britain’s ‘Big Four’ banks buck the trend of DEI retreat

A counterbalance to claims of trans-Atlantic ESG de-prioritisation, Finextra’s investigation into the UK’s top financial institutions prove that some industries are keeping ESG front of mind. On Sunday 6 June 2025, The Observer published an article in its business and economics section which revealed how leading British firms had “re-written” thei...

17 June 2025 /inclusion

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