Dear Subscriber,

Here it is, the final newsletter of January 2016! It’s been quite a month, and quite a start to the New Year in the world of payments. Contactless went from strength to strength, first by making up 10 per cent of all card transactions, then by making up 25 per cent of all pay-as-you-go Tfl transactions and now by reaching the milestone of £1 billion spent in a single month. An infographic from our sister publication, Pivotl, presents its research that indicates FinTech M&A is poised for frenzy this year.

But just when you think all these digital innovations are putting pressure on older payment methods, Jenny Campbell, CEO of YourCash Europe, jumps to its defence arguing it has ‘too many benefits to disappear’. Elsewhere, Samsung Pay hits Europe with partnership with Spanish Bank, Caixa and Tom Davies, Head of Strategic Partnerships at BCSG, explores how banks can rebuild their relationships with SMEs. Finally, we introduce you to the FinTech Innovation Awards judges.

In this guest post Tom Davies, Head of Strategic Partnerships at BCSG, explores how banks can rebuild their relationships with SMEs.

In this interview, Jenny Campbell, owner and CEO of YourCash Europe, talks about the recent news that cash withdrawals around the world have increased and puts down some predictions for cash’s near future.

In just three months since the introduction of the higher spending limit, we jumped from spending £634m to £1.02 billion in a single month, according to new data from The UK Cards Association. By contrast, in January 2015, contactless spending amounted to just £287 million.

The FinTech Innovation Awards are now in their second year, and the judging panel is only getting more illustrious. Meet a few of the FinTech wonders selecting this year’s winners.

Spanish bank, CaixaBank, has partnered with Samsung to roll out the latter’s mobile payment service, Samsung Pay, over the next several months.

Payments is a massively, confusingly and unsustainably fragmented industry right now. So it’s no surprise that 47 per cent of global fintech M&A deals tracked by Pivotl last year were payments companies getting snapped up.