Liberté, Égalité, Technologie! ‘Unloved' Revolut wooed by French
Qu'est-ce qui se passe? You may well choke over your morning coffee. Revolut, one of Britain's hottest companies, born and nurtured in London, appears to have put two fingers up to its home town.
At the Choose France summit in Versailles, the fintech 'chose' France, promising to invest €1 billion in our ancient rival over the next few years and to base its western European headquarters there.
Yes, it still has a Canary Wharf global HQ, but the move is perceived as yet another sign of how France is snapping at Britain's heels as the home for tech in Europe.
Led by quintessentially tech-bro politician President Macron, the Élysée is pouring billions into making France a digital superpower. From AI labs in Paris to
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Telegraph
17 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Farage ‘seeks less powerful chairman' after Yusuf quits
Nigel Farage is considering appointing a less powerful Reform UK chairman after the sudden departure of Zia Yusuf, The Telegraph understands. Senior party figures have discussed splitting the role into several positions when Mr Yusuf is replaced, following his dramatic resignation on Thursday. Reform sources told The Telegraph that the former chairman had 'rubbed some people up the wrong way', and that a key factor in his departure was high workload. 'He was on a mission, working 18 hours a day,' said one source. 'He was doing it all unpaid, and he expected everyone else to work equally hard.' Mr Farage and the party's officials are working out how to replace the 38-year-old businessman, who said he no longer thought it was 'a good use of his time' to work on getting Reform into government. It came after an apparent dispute between Mr Yusuf and other senior figures over whether the party should campaign to ban the burka, which was suggested by the newest Reform MP Sarah Pochin at Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday. Mr Yusuf said later it was 'dumb' to suggest policies Reform did not support, but Lee Anderson, the Reform chief whip, said he backed a ban. Mr Farage and Richard Tice, the deputy leader, both said they thought there should be a 'debate' on face coverings, including burkas, in the UK. One party source said Mr Yusuf was 'unpopular' with other members of staff, and had become 'super stretched' in managing the day-to-day running of Reform and the party's new ' Doge ' efficiency drive in the ten councils it won in last month's local elections. That workload led him to become 'authoritarian' and a 'control freak', said another figure close to Reform. Mr Farage said on Thursday that Mr Yusuf brought a 'bit of a Goldman Sachs mentality' to the role, which others said was a coded reference to his high-pressure management style. But the Reform leader also said he was 'sad' his chairman was leaving, and that he had only ten minutes' notice that he intended to resign. The tipping point for Mr Yusuf came on Wednesday, when he learned of Ms Pochin's question about burkas to Sir Keir Starmer from reading about it online. Mr Yusuf, who is a Muslim, had been receiving abuse from far-Right trolls online, which Mr Farage said had become difficult for him to bear. He had also reportedly become frustrated that another staff member had taken control of the party's operations, and felt he had been isolated from conversations about policy. He said on Thursday: '11 months ago I became Chairman of Reform. I've worked full time as a volunteer to take the party from 14 to 30 per cent, quadrupled its membership and delivered historic electoral results. I no longer believe working to get a Reform government elected is a good use of my time, and hereby resign the office.' Multiple sources said Mr Yusuf had performed well in the job, but was not a popular figure within the team. 'He didn't do what a chairman is meant to do, which is to bring people in and bring them along with you,' said one Reform source, adding: 'He isolated a lot of the staff.' Another added: 'Everyone is very sad about it. He wasn't popular with the staff, but he did a good job in the role. It all happened very suddenly – he'd had enough.' The next chairman may be given a more traditional figurehead role within the party, rather than running its expansion, elections and financial affairs as Mr Yusuf did. Mr Farage could appoint a chief executive alongside a new chairman, using funds raised by Nick Candy, the Reform treasurer. Upcoming donations returns are expected to show that the party raised more than £2.5 million in the first quarter of this year – putting Reform in contention to be the biggest fundraiser among the Westminster parties. Both the Conservatives and Labour have suffered a cash crunch since last year's election, and have laid off staff members. Early contenders to replace Mr Yusuf include Andy Wigmore and Arron Banks, the ' bad boys of Brexit ' who worked with Mr Farage on the campaign in 2016. One figure close to the party said Mr Farage could approach Ann Widdecombe, the former Conservative MP and MEP who stood for Reform at the 2019 election. Ms Widdecombe, who said last month she disagreed with Reform's policy to expand access to the winter fuel allowance, told The Telegraph she had not been approached about the job. Mr Yusuf's departure is the latest in a series of internal disputes within Reform, including a public row between the chairman and Rupert Lowe, who was elected for the party last year but has since been ejected. Mr Yusuf did not respond to a request for comment.
Finextra
21 minutes ago
- Finextra
Tech-Driven BNPL: How Sophisticated Technologies Are Reshaping the BNPL Market: By Bekhzod Botirov
Bekhzod Botirov, fintech expert, co-owner and member of the PayWay Supervisory Board, outlines how new technologies are reshaping the global BNPL market from reducing risks and improving customer services to refining operations and providing increasingly sophisticated offerings. By 2028, the number of users of BNPL services (Buy Now, Pay Later) is predicted to double to 670 million, an explosive 107% growth compared to 2024. However, as the industry flourishes, so inevitably do the risks ranging from fraud to late payments. To address these issues, international leaders such as Klarna, Afterpay, PayPal, and Affirm are already using artificial intelligence (AI) and big data to minimise their losses and at the same time personalize services for customers and increase sales. Affirm has introduced dynamic payment schedules in the US, while Riverty in Germany uses AI-driven tools to predict user behavior and optimize repayment plans. Afterpay is using big data and AI to ensure a smooth user experience and improved risk management. PayPal's BNPL solution, Pay in 4, incorporates sophisticated fraud prevention technology and machine learning models to assess creditworthiness quickly. Among other things, Sezzle is using machine learning for customer risk assessment and to offer tailored financing options. These, and other BNPL firms are demonstrating how technology, including machine learning, AI and predictive analytics are being used to make services faster, more secure, and more personalized for consumers. However, the wider context is competitive pressures, regulatory demands, and new standards, all of which are pushing providers to improve credit assessment capabilities. As BNPL companies incorporate technologies to meet improved credit assessment objectives they're also discovering further advantages such as improved fraud detection, flexible, transparent payment options, interest-free payment plans, reduced risk of late payments and so on. And with market growth firmly on an upward trajectory BNPL's early adopters are gaining material and market advantage. In a recent report ResearchandMarkets says the BNPL payment market is expected to grow by 13.7% on an annual basis to reach US$560.1 billion in 2025. Further the global market is forecast to grow at a CAGR of 10.2% during 2025-2030 and by the end of 2030 is expected to be worth approximately USD 911.8 billion. There are also further potential technology driven benefits that may not be immediately obvious. For instance, if technology is used to establish information sharing across BNPL players, all companies will be able to see if a borrower has installment plans with other BNPL companies, making the market more transparent and significantly reducing defaults. The growth of BNPL is directly tied to advancements in digital payment technologies, making them an inseparable part of the market's future, so at the very least awareness of the potential of new technologies is incumbent on all players as the market continues to evolve. AI powerfully improves operations from scoring to personalisation AI is having a dramatic impact on the BNPL market. AI-powered credit systems reduce default rates and improve customer satisfaction. Providers that excel in data-driven decision-making will strengthen their market leadership with in-depth analysis of customers' financial behaviour such as what they spend money on, what they invest in, how often they take out loans or request a credit history. Tied to AI are neural networks which can, among other things, also assess a user's social media behaviour to provide ever deeper insight into 'credit worthiness'. AI algorithms can even consider macroeconomic factors like rising unemployment in different regions. AI can also help predict the probability of defaults by detecting patterns that indicate possible financial difficulties such as unstable payments on other instalment plans. It can also help improve customer experience and reduce employee workload and service costs. For instance, AI assistants can carry out the initial processing of customer requests, automate the collection of debts and send borrowers reminders about payments as well as updating customer information. AI can also help personalise offers for users and increase conversions. If, for example, a borrower is making payments on time, customised repayment schedules or raised borrower limits can be offered. It's also possible to predict which product instalment will be the most relevant for the customer. If a consumer bought a PlayStation several years ago, a trade-in programme can offer a new model. For fraud prevention, neural networks can identify anomalies such as a customer applying for a new line of credit from a location that is different to the usual location. Machine learning models can identify high-risk borrowers, fraudulent activities, and outlier behavior. BNPL market leaders are already actively using AI. Klarna and Riverty have implemented machine learning models to offer personalised payment schedules and identify high-risk borrowers. Klarna has also partnered with OpenAI to launch an AI assistant. In its first month alone, it had 2.3 million conversations with customers, two-thirds of all dialogues. The company claims that the bot does the work of seven hundred full-time employees. But AI isn't the preserve of international market leaders. Alif, an Uzbek company, has developed a machine learning based credit scoring model that reduces the time to make decisions on applications to seconds, reduces the percentage of delinquencies and increases the sales of goods in instalments. Alif has also introduced a chatbot that handles thousands of consumer queries across different communication channels, far faster than people could. Blockchain, a new world of transparency and financing models The use of blockchain technology is still in its early stages, but it holds significant potential to transform various aspects of BNPL operations, from improved transparency and trust to regulatory compliance. For instance, it eliminates the manipulation of records of payments, debts, and transaction terms, as each transaction is recorded in a distributed ledger. Blockchain also allows many processes to be automated through smart contracts. These digital agreements are honoured automatically when conditions are met. As an example, if a customer is severely late with a payment, a smart contract can activate sanctions. BNPL platforms can also use smart contracts that automatically analyse a user's wallet and provide a score based on machine learning algorithms. The analysis considers the transaction history in the blockchain such as cryptocurrency payments and activity on DeFi platforms. With the help of blockchain, BNPL services will also be able to raise finance. Tokenised assets backed by receivables can be issued. Investors will buy them on secondary markets, increasing the liquidity of BNPL providers. And cryptocurrencies can facilitate cross-border transfers and help companies receive capital from investors around the world without the complexities of currency regulation. That said, the risks of using unstable cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin, needs to be noted. Fluctuations in value can affect the size of the debt. The solution in this case could be stablecoins, the rate of which is linked to other assets. Nexo, a large international company, uses this method to save crypto assets, pay with them and take loans. Nexo claims that the volume of transactions and loans issued on the platform has already exceeded $320 billion. In order to develop the market, government agencies need to develop a legal status for BNPL players on the blockchain. But it's important to note its early days for blockchain. There are not many specialists who know how to develop blockchain systems, even in the global market. For instance, international BNPL services are still looking at the technology. Klarna only announced in February of this year that it was exploring options for integrating cryptocurrencies into its platform. While blockchain offers enormous potential today blockchain adoption is more complicated than AI. A number of regulatory and infrastructural issues need to be resolved to develop the technology. The most realistic scenario today is the development of hybrid BNPL services. In this case, the currency familiar to the population, and blockchain technologies, can be used to record and automate payments. But for this purpose it is still necessary to create a local platform supporting smart contracts for BNPL. Road to the future is lined with superapps and cards In Asia-Pacific, BNPL adoption is heavily influenced by integration with super apps like Grab, Gojek, and WeChat. These platforms offer instalment plans across various services, from ride-hailing to food delivery, providing users with a single app to access myriad services. Superapps serve millions of users daily, so it makes absolute sense for BNPL providers to use these platforms to gain instant access to a vast, engaged audience. It also makes sense for the superapp platform. By embedding BNPL, these apps increase user engagement and transaction volume across multiple services. For instance, Grab PayLater provides BNPL services to millions of Grab users for rides, food delivery, and online shopping. The Paytm Postpaid superapp in India uses Paytm's transaction data to determine BNPL eligibility. And in China, Alipay and WeChat Pay offer BNPL options that allows users to split payments across thousands of merchants. BNPL providers can offer personalized credit limits, reduce default risks with better scoring models and provide custom BNPL plans based on user history. BNPL services integrated into superapps also allow providers to provide instant checkout options, loyalty programs and cashback offers and embedded financing across multiple services. International BNPL leaders such as Klarna, Affirm and Afterpay, in partnership with commercial banks, marketplaces, e-commerce shops and large retail chains, also offer debit cards to users. They can be used, among other things, to buy goods in instalments. However, there is certainly potential to offer even more services such as providing points for on-time instalment payments, which consumers can spend on real goods. Looking further ahead, banks, including microfinance banks, could cooperate with specialised BNPL services and issue debit cards on a white label model. Of course, this approach would require adherence to regulation and would probably require licences from BNPL-providers. Superapps are reshaping the BNPL landscape by embedding BNPL into everyday digital experiences. Their massive user bases and data insights make them 'goldmine' partners for BNPL providers. At the same time cards have a bright future in some territories, and while already in widespread adoption there is certainly room for added services that refine BNPL offerings.
Telegraph
32 minutes ago
- Telegraph
The middle-class student activists motivated by ‘privilege guilt'
From chants to 'Globalise the Intifada' on the leafy campuses of New England to anti-colonial vandalism in 700-year-old Oxbridge colleges, the more prestigious the university, the more amenable it seems to anti-West radicalism. Last week, Sciences Po – the Paris university that serves as a finishing school for France's elite – was accused of being 'ruined by woke radicals' in a book by a Le Figaro journalist. Similar accusations are made against Harvard, Yale and Columbia in the United States and Oxford and Cambridge in Britain. Trans rights, climate change, and Black Lives Matter have all been sources of fierce student protest in recent years. But nothing appears to have radicalised elite students more than the war in Gaza. Israel's response to the attack by Hamas on October 7 has emerged as the principal motivation for protests by some of the highest-status students in the world – those who supposedly work to the highest standards and expect to reap the rewards of their privilege as future, highly-paid leaders in business, politics, and law. A disproportionate number of students at elite universities are also from middle-class backgrounds. In 2023, one in three successful Oxford applicants and a quarter of successful Cambridge applicants came from private schools. 'There is a paradox at the heart of this,' says historian and former Oxford professor David Abulafia, who has criticised the excesses of woke ideology in our culture. 'The protesters are obsessed with entitlement and ideas like how evil whiteness is, but of course, most of them are entitled and the vast majority are white. The positions they take are full of contradictions.' It is not a coincidence that some of the most privileged students are adopting these positions, says Abulafia. 'There is an embarrassment about being in a privileged situation. People want to appear to reject characteristics they themselves have and the only way they seem to be able to deal with these characteristics is to side with those who are critical of them.' Columbia University in New York has become the epicentre of student radicalism over the Gaza conflict, with the tents of the 'Gaza Solidarity Encampment' appearing in April last year. This climaxed with the occupation of Hamilton Hall, brought to an end by riot police and the arrest of more than 100 people. Last month, police in helmets streamed into the university to remove a group of mask-clad protesters, some of whom had written 'Columbia will burn' across pictures. Four days after the Hamas attack on Israel, the Harvard Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee released a statement that students 'hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence'. It was co-signed by 33 student groups. Protests have flared at Harvard and fellow Ivy League giant Yale ever since. In April this year at Yale, some 200 keffiyeh-wearing protesters chanted, 'We will honour all our martyrs.' With the protests have come complaints by Jewish students that they have been made to feel unsafe and intimidated by rising anti-Semitism. This pattern of radical protest by students at elite universities is mirrored in Britain. One of the Just Stop Oil activists accused of defacing Stonehenge last April, Niamh Lynch, 22, was an Oxford student. Lynch denies the charges against her and, at a hearing in January, asked for her trial not to clash with her university exams this summer. It has been set for October. In 2023, Daniel Knorr, a 21-year-old biochemistry undergraduate, allegedly sprayed the Radcliffe Camera Building in Oxford with orange paint in protest at the university's links with fossil fuel companies. He has pleaded not guilty and his trial will take place in August. Chiara Sarti, a PhD student at King's College, Cambridge, sprayed her own college building with orange paint in 2023 and in March last year, an unidentified member of Palestine Action (it's still not known whether they attended the university) knifed and defaced a painting of Lord Balfour in Trinity College, Cambridge, for his part in the creation of the state of Israel. In January, members of Oxford Action for Palestine seized the Radcliffe Camera Building. The group said it had renamed it the Khalida Jarrar Library, after the leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a proscribed terror group. Meanwhile, Phoebe Plummer – who was convicted of defacing Van Gogh's Sunflowers at the National Gallery in 2022 – studied at Manchester University having attended a £50,000-a-year boarding school in Ascot. Douglas Headley, a professor of philosophy of religion, has worked at Cambridge's divinity faculty for almost three decades, since 1996. In that time, the university has seen protests ranging from large-scale demonstrations on the Iraq War and student fees, to the recent acts of vandalism by Just Stop Oil and pro-Palestinian activists. In March, the High Court granted Cambridge an injunction preventing protesters from disrupting graduation events. On Friday Trinity and St John's Colleges sought fresh injunctions against pro-Palestinian demonstrators as a result of an encampment set up on their land over the previous weekend. 'For young people, a cocktail of radicalism within a secure environment is unbelievably attractive,' says Hedley. 'The ideologically driven self-hatred and hatred of the country is the core of this problem.' Is it possible that the privilege actually increases the students' urge to be more radical? What motivates their keenness to rubbish the heritage from which they have benefitted more than anyone, and where does their moral certainty come from? 'Some privileged young people understand they have had access to things that others do not,' explains Paul Glynn, clinical director at Klearminds therapy group, who has worked with students on issues of privilege. 'The key emotions are guilt and shame. Guilt is an activating emotion – it's about making amends or a correction. Shame can be isolating. A student can often deny or avoid exposing their privilege to others.' 'Privilege can result in 'overcompensation', where students experiencing guilt align themselves with causes that make them feel like they have a less privileged identity,' adds Glynn. When students chant 'Globalise the Intifada' on campus, it's an expression of an overtly binary view of the world, an expression that can be linked to their privilege. 'Certainty is attractive,' says Glynn. 'Most of these issues are complex, but we don't like that so let's make it good or evil.' 'What strikes me is the lack of knowledge among students,' says Abulafia. 'With the Gaza/Israel example there is a complete ignorance about the historical context. They don't really seem to be interested.' The anti-Vietnam marches of the 1960s were an attempt to stop a war which had direct consequences for American students, with a chance that you, your friends or family members could be drafted to fight and die on the other side of the world. The current protests have grown in a hothouse of identity politics – in which protesters' views on Gaza are part of a broader world view that tends to encompass critical race theory, extreme trans rights and anti-capitalist activism. Through this lens, Israel is perceived to be a white colonising state and therefore bears the sins of all colonialists, with its associations of racism, apartheid and exploitation. As Abulafia highlights, in many cases, the students appear to be rejecting the world that got them to such colleges in the first place. If they are told the system is bad, they must be bad too. Assumptions about colonialism in higher education that sprang from Edward Said's 1978 book Orientalism and the influence of French intellectuals such as Michel Foucault have contributed to the notion of a hierarchy of oppression, from which students can judge who and what deserves the most sympathy. Katharine Birbalsingh, a leading headteacher who advocates for freedom of speech, suggests that the problem starts at school – specifically private school classrooms – where the connection between privilege and guilt is first made. 'It seems obvious there is a relationship between what you might call 'woke' culture and privilege,' says Birbalsingh. 'By that I include mainly white, middle-class people. Woke ideas like 'decolonisation' and criticism of Western values are everywhere in the most exclusive private school classrooms and that feeds into universities. 'One example is outside speakers who come into private schools and imply that there is something wrong with being privileged and they point towards absolving themselves by embracing Black Lives Matter or the trans movement.' Birbalsingh recently claimed that transgender children are more likely to be 'white and privileged' and that many were searching for 'victimhood narratives', which are 'admired' in modern society. Deferring to your less privileged peers A key part of the dynamic between privilege and protest is how some students react to their less socially advantaged peers. Psychologists suggest students who are perceived to be 'marginalised' are more likely to be listened to, especially when it comes to theories around race and history. 'We have found that students from less privileged backgrounds are deferred to by more privileged ones, because the privileged students believe that the opinions and beliefs of others must be more authentic,' says Dr Helena Bunn, a member of the British Psychological Society and a director of a doctorate programme that explores social justice, oppression and privilege with students at the University of East London. 'The privileged students feel compelled to become advocates for a cause they have little personal connection to. If there is guilt about privilege, that can lead to less critical thinking. 'There can also be a sense of 'I feel I have to do something' so they follow the opinions of others who are seen to be less privileged. It can be as simple as just thinking 'something is wrong here' like a war for example, but the emotional priority is to belong to the cause.' Perhaps the most infamous example of student entitlement was recorded during the Columbia tent encampment, with the appearance of Johannah King-Slutzky as its spokesperson. King-Slutzky, a PhD English student and the daughter of psychologists, warned that students illegally occupying university property could 'die of dehydration and starvation' if they were not given supplies. The protests have raised the ire of the Trump administration, which sees the demonstrations as evidence that universities such as Columbia and Harvard are gripped by a 'woke' elite complicit in the radicalisation of their students. The US president threatened to redirect $3 billion in Harvard research grants last week, following a decision to suspend foreign students from enrolling. 'Harvard is treating our country with great disrespect,' he said. 'Globalise the Intifada' may be cosplay rebellion for some privileged students and a way of expiating guilt for others, but sceptics argue the increasing prevalence of the chant has real-world consequences. The former New York Times columnist Bari Weiss pointed to recent attacks on Jews in New York and Colorado, saying: 'It was dismissed as a metaphor and not what it always was: a demand for open season on Jewish people worldwide.' 'The elite institutions have been ideologically captured,' says Hedley. 'When I worked in the US, I noticed the universities you would assume to be the best weren't because their departments and academics were taken over by a gender and race ideology. Once you turn a university into an ideological arena, it encourages the students to express their outrage and their virtue in ways the average person outside is not going to be very impressed with.'
