Fintech

What Does Fintech Mean?

The term “fintech,” sometimes capitalized “Fintech” or “FinTech,” is a general comprehensive term for financial technologies, many of which are rapidly changing the financial industry. As a portmanteau of the words “finance” and “technology,” fintech is often used by technology journalists and others to describe technologies as diverse as cryptocurrency tools, financial transaction platforms and industry-specific middleware programs.

Advertisements

Techopedia Explains Fintech

One example of fintech is the blockchain ledger technology tied to cryptocurrencies like bitcoin. As an alternative to traditional accounting, blockchain provides a ledger that is set in stone and cannot be falsified in particular ways that have traditionally driven embezzlement and corruption.

Many other kinds of fintech are widely used in today's finance world. Some are geared toward helping companies achieve compliance with standards like Basel and Sarbanes-Oxley, while others accommodate the routine digital work involved in common banking and financial tasks. New online banking models could be described as fintech, as could the evolution of platforms to handle cyber security for finance data. All of these are examples of a new class of technology that is aimed at enhancing our collective commerce systems.

Advertisements

Related Terms

Latest Buzzwords and Jargon Terms

Related Reading

Margaret Rouse

Margaret Rouse is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical, business audience. Over the past twenty years her explanations have appeared on TechTarget websites and she's been cited as an authority in articles by the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine and Discovery Magazine.Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages. If you have a suggestion for a new definition or how to improve a technical explanation, please email Margaret or contact her…