Title - Benefits of APIs For Fintech Innovation
Title - Benefits of APIs For Fintech Innovation
The banking and finance industry is changing by leaps and bounds and fintech APIs today have become the new rage! Some of the known names are Stripe, Pinwheel, Sila, and Apex, used in digital banking, investment management, cryptocurrency, and blockchain technology. Fintech application programming interfaces (APIs) are seen transforming financial services, business models and the current market dynamics a lot lately.
#1 Enhanced
Customer Experience 4
Security 5
With the ever-growing technological advancements, not just businesses across the globe but even end users are found acknowledging as well as adapting to these accelerated changes and adoption of digital models among different industries such as retail, manufacturing, finance, hospitality etc. Slowly and steadily API-first companies have begun gaining more attention. The time has come we have to see beyond fintech. Not to mention, more and more banks and financial institutions are delving into the concept of digital payments, and enhanced banking experience with fintech API. The following post focuses on what is a fintech API and how these are beneficial in the long run.
Introducing
Fintech APIs
We are now living in the age of digitalization, so there is no scope for not using a wallet app or retrieving funds from your bank account or not making Amazon payments using your credit card. Well, API is responsible for all this! API stands for Application Programming Interfaces mainly bridging the unseen gap between different softwares and applications. For instance, I am sure you must have seen a financial app using an open banking API to connect a user’s bank and retrieve the required amount of balance.
Now as an end user what you see is all the relevant information on the screen. However, what happens behind the scenes is what matters the most! Here developers tend to design apps in such a way that they can easily store data in different databases using APIS. And here an API gathers all this information and data and sends it to the end user whenever required via the app. All these databases are mainly used for offering third-party services.
Now why is there a need for an API in the first place? Well, no two platforms or softwares are compatible right from the beginning. So to fill in that gap, developers are often asked to use different programming languages, and technical aspects and here’s when API acts as an interpreter.
Sharing relevant information between applications is possible only via using APIs. Technically speaking, an API is more or less a kind of code used by different applications to communicate and end-users to carry out different services. Whether it’s the bank or consumers, third-party service providers, APIs can work with any party and that too in a seamless manner.
By using APIs, data exchange is possible but in a safe and simple manner. Here security plays a major aspect. Further below I would like to mention certain benefits of APIs and how they can assist in enhancing the fintech revolution.
Types
of Fintech APIs
● Financial data providers - Working with
different third-party applications is pretty easy. Moreover, accessing bank
accounts and credit card information is no big deal.
● Payment Processors - Stripe and Paypal are the
key players here.
● Security Management tools - Several face ID, Biometric, and multi-factor authentication features are incorporated into the existing apps for enhanced security.
So whether it's banking or eCommerce payments, accounting, or finance,
take any such sector into account, API will be found making a rapid
transition.
Benefits
of Fintech APIs
#1
Enhanced Customer Experience
One of the obvious benefits of using fintech API is that they ensure an enhanced customer experience. Today more and more customers, especially millennials, are found to be dependent on banking, insurance, and financial management sectors. And why not, since they offer 24/7 services, seamless experience and accurate data? When you do have an option of receiving all the details and making payments sitting at home why choose traditional banking ways?
#2
Cost-effectiveness
It may quite interest you to know that there was a time when offering a wide range of services to customers was a costly venture for banks. Fortunately, the scenario does not exist any longer. Now checking account details, and keeping tabs on your savings account is pretty easy-peasy and of course, not costly at all. Banks these days are able to offer more agility and one-stop processes. Now you must be wondering, what is the role of API here?
Well, API here tends to assist in customizing or personalizing a client’s experience. More or less, this surely leads to lowering the overall cost for financial organizations as well as the end users. The one-size fits all model no longer is much in vogue. In fact, here you have the choice to make. As a banking customer, you can decide whether to use programs and apps that precisely meet your needs and not to use the ones which are not much in use.
#3
Quick time to Market
One of the most crucial advantages offered by Fintech API is that it leads to faster development. It may quite interest you to know that these Application Programming Interfaces do have the ability to accelerate software development procedures to a great extent. All you need to do is make specific choices by keeping your needs and requirements in mind and leaving everything else on these APIs. They can communicate seamlessly and reduce the overall time of application development.
Further, I would like to mention some used cases of Fintech APIs.
Use
Cases of fintech API
1.
Smart Contracts
One of the finest examples of using fintech API is smart contracts. I am pretty sure this is not the first time you have heard of Smart Contracts. Well, especially in the Blockchain and fintech world, it seems to be pretty much hyped. As the name implies, smart indicates towards smartphones. Earlier, it was impossible to work using conventional phones. Similarly, now we have smart contracts. It’s a self-executing computer code that is tamper-proof and is executed in an exclusive manner. No wonder today technology seems to have become a versatile umpire of trust.
Some of the core aspects of smart contracts include:
● Digital signatures or cryptographic digital
signature
● Oracles
● Self-execution
2.
Security
After the COVID pandemic, cybercriminals are pretty much on the verge of looking around for relevant opportunities to threaten businesses as well as individuals using malware, ransomware and social engineering attacks. Since COVID, we have witnessed a massive shift in the work-from-home scenario but what we might have missed so far is increasing vulnerability and cyber-attacks. With a little change in your approach, things can be well-taken care of.
Some of the best yet crucial fintech security trends to make a note of
include:
● AI in detecting fraud
● Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) Solutions
● Advance Blockchain Systems
● Smart Security Solutions
By adopting these solutions, you will face fewer headaches and bottlenecks in case any such situation comes up. Also, it won’t have a negative impact on your business.
P2P
Networking
Another interesting way of Fintech APIs is Peer-to-Peer currency exchange and lending. Currency exchange has always been in demand. With the rage of Fintech APIs, slowly and steadily startups seem to have eliminated all the intermediaries in between. Today more and more banks are found integrating well with their end users. Right from executing searches to performing orders, and configuring lending portfolios, everything can be well-taken care of.
Final
Words
With the rise in Fintech APIs, the future seems to be pretty promising and bright. Don’t be surprised, if you find banks connecting with relevant eCommerce websites especially to facilitate online payments.
All you have to do is get in touch with a relevant fintech software development company that has appropriate knowledge and experience in delivering the best possible solutions for the end users. You see with such technological advancements happening day in and day out, new and unimaginable doorways of reliable and fast delivery of apps seem to have opened. So what are you sitting tight for? Time to reap as many benefits as you can and ride the digital wave.
So that’s all for now! In case, if you have any doubts or queries, feel free to mention that in the comment section below.
