Love Finance: Is buy to let over?

Why we love finance this week?

Stifling property investment, moving beyond lip service, and betting everything on fintech.

Autumn statement changes the buy to let market overnight.

Two weeks on from the Autumn Statement, the negative reactions to the announcement of the increase in buy to let stamp duty have been replaced.

Experts now predict that the rise will quicken the pace of the already speedy buy to let market over the coming months as people rush to beat the April deadline for the introduction of the new, higher rate.

We love that the Bank of England has seen the linked consequences of pensions freedoms and the shrinking home-buyers market and moved to dampen interest. However, it still feels like a very blunt taxation tool and we wonder what real affect this will have on the British obsession with property.

Who will win over the millennials?

Mysis and EFMA have released their findings into the state of retail banking and the move towards a digital future.

They highlight the surprising revelation that digital channels aren’t yet driving significant sales, but that initiatives like Barclays LifeSkills are improving engagement with millennials, who will have the highest spending power of any generation by 2018, and who by 2025 will make up three quarters of the global workforce. We love that the study highlights the importance of service cultures to engender loyalty and value. But we also reflect that these are yet to knock sales off the top of the metrics pile.

Making a Rakuten

As Japan’s economy enters its fourth recession in five years, the Japanese ecommerce giant, Rakuten, has invested $100m in a new fintech fund looking at disruptive early and mid-stage start-ups. It’s already had success with previous fintech investments such as Currency Cloud, WePay and Bitnet. We love the focus on financial services, but we wonder whether this overheating sector can really deliver the returns.