Banu Raghuraman

expert panel

Banks once viewed fintech as an existential threat. Now fintechs are pursuing banking licenses while traditional institutions adopt fintech-style technology and customer experiences. Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank explain why the real winners may be the companies that combine financial trust, regulatory strength, technology and customer focus.For years, fintechs challenged traditional banks with faster technology, simpler digital products and better customer experiences. Now, the lines are blurring as fintechs pursue banking capabilities and established financial institutions adopt the technology that helped their challengers gain ground.This convergence reflects a broader shift in financial services. Global fintech investment reached $103.1 billion in the first half of 2026, even as deal volume declined, signaling greater investor selectivity and a focus on scalable business models, according to KPMG. Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank examine what this changing landscape means for financial institutions competing on technology, trust and customer value.The question is no longer simply whether fintechs can become banks or banks can become more like fintechs. It is which companies can combine the strongest capabilities of both to deliver better financial products and experiences.

expert panel

A fintech platform can simplify banking for solopreneurs, but convenience alone is not enough. FinTech Think Tank members explain how to evaluate deposit insurance, security controls, data practices, reliability, customer support and backup banking options before putting an entire business on one platform.For a solopreneur, putting banking, payments, payroll, taxes and cash management in one app can make running a business dramatically easier. It can also concentrate the consequences of an outage, frozen account, fraud incident or platform failure in a single place.Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank share their expertise across fintech, payments, banking technology and financial infrastructure to answer a question that goes beyond whether an app looks secure: What is actually underneath it, and can the business keep operating if something goes wrong?The answer is not necessarily to choose a traditional bank over fintech, or fintech over a bank. Instead, solopreneurs should evaluate the infrastructure behind the product, understand how their money and data are handled and build enough redundancy to keep one technology failure from becoming a business crisis.

expert panel

As traditional financial institutions explore digital assets, members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank highlight the importance of governance, operational infrastructure, risk management and customer education before adding these assets to products or portfolios.Digital assets are moving closer to the mainstream financial system, creating new opportunities for traditional financial institutions while introducing unfamiliar operational, regulatory and customer risks.For leaders considering whether and how to add digital assets to their offerings or portfolios, the question is not simply whether customers want exposure. It is whether the institution can support that exposure with the same standards of accountability, security and transparency expected across the rest of its financial operations.Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank point to three priorities: understanding where governance gaps remain, adapting the infrastructure behind custody and settlement and educating customers about what they are actually buying and how their assets are protected.

expert panel

As banks and fintechs blur into one financial ecosystem, consumers are left deciding whom to trust with their money and their data. Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank explain why the winners of the next five years will be the institutions that treat trust, not technology, as their core product.The line between traditional banking and fintech has all but disappeared. Banks now embed AI-driven tools once associated with scrappy startups, while fintechs increasingly offer the deposit accounts, lending products and compliance infrastructure once reserved for chartered banks. The result is a financial ecosystem where consumers can no longer tell, at a glance, who is actually holding their money or making decisions about their financial lives.That blurring raises the stakes for trust. Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank, a curated group of financial technology leaders and advisors, agree that winning and keeping consumer trust over the next five years will require more than faster apps or smarter algorithms. It will demand transparency, consistency and a demonstrated commitment to acting in the customer's best interest.Their perspectives, drawn from decades of experience building products and companies across banking, payments and wealth technology, offer a practical roadmap for leaders navigating this shift.This piece builds on Senior Executive's recent look at where AI is and isn't earning trust in fintech, zooming out from specific AI use cases to the broader question of what it takes to win consumer trust as banking and fintech become one category.

expert panel

AI is already reshaping fraud prevention, account monitoring and personal finance tools, but fintech leaders say the industry is still falling short on transparency and on truly understanding the people behind the transactions. Members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank break down where the technology is delivering real value, where it's falling short and what leaders should do next.Financial institutions have poured billions into artificial intelligence over the past two years, and the payoff is starting to show. Fraud detection is sharper, customer service is faster and personalization has moved well past generic marketing emails. Yet those gains have exposed a deeper challenge: an IDC study commissioned by Atlanta-based Sage found that 71% of finance leaders would reject an AI tool that was 99% accurate if it couldn't explain its answers. More than half would pay a premium for AI that shows its work. For every leap forward, executives are discovering how much further the industry has to go when it comes to transparency, customer trust and understanding people rather than simply transaction histories.To make sense of where AI is truly moving the needle in financial services, and where the industry keeps stumbling, we turned to members of the Senior Executive FinTech Think Tank, a curated group of financial technology leaders and advisors. Their answers point to a pattern: the easy wins are technical, and the harder, more valuable work is human.Here, they share where they see AI creating meaningful change today, and where they believe the industry is still getting it wrong.