Nowadays, ICO or initial coin offerings are fashionable. ICO stands for the financial resources attracted in cryptocurrency from risk capital investors. In Latvia, just one company – “Digipulse” - has succeeded so far. What is this success based on and how can one achieve reliability? These were the main subjects discussed by the participants of Rietumu Fintech Club at their fifth meeting in the co-working space “The Mill”.

airBaltic was the first airline in the world to announce that it accepts payments in cryptocurrency. Although demand is not big, it is still significant enough to believe that at least some part of the future lies there. During the Rietumu Fintech Club meeting in September 2017, Senior Vice President of eCommerce, Marketing and Sales at airBaltic Jouni Oksanen shared his observations on new fintech technologies disrupting the airline industry.

Last Thursday a closed club discussion was held, which was devoted to innovative financial technologies in traditional business areas. This time, the club participants were airBaltic Senior Vice-president in E-commerce, Marketing and Sales Jouni Oksanen, Maxima Head of Corporate Relations Ivars Svilāns, Printify representative James Berdigans, Rietumu Bank Senior Vice-president and Member of the Board Eugene Dugaev, as well as experts of the financial industry and startup environment representatives.

CBS Insights has published a review on investments in fintech companies around the world in Q2 2017. In total, venture capital has financed 251 transactions to the total amount of USD 5.2 billion. Experts assure - if such growth continues, at the end of the year there will be 19% more investment transactions, in comparison with 2016. In Europe, there have been 56 investment transactions in fintech companies and the total amount of transactions has exceeded USD 500 million.