The FinHUb

April 2024 | Volume 6
From South africa to Nigeria to the United Kingdom.
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GenesisBloc LaunchPad

We're proud to announce the launch of our first pre-incubator programme, GenesisBloc. An initiative to nurture aspiring entrepreneurs by transforming innovative blockchain concepts into thriving businesses.

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Thought Leadership

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Annual FINHUB REPORT | 2023

We are so excited to share with you our annual report on the achievements and excellence in our community this past year

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The Hub acts as a forum to facilitate important discussions between academics and entrepreneurs from the Hub with senior policy makers and leading industry experts.
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The Hub organises at least one academic and policy conference every year, usually in conjunction with Algorand partner universities or with other leading universities. These conferences aim to bring together leading academics in our five research area work streams, as well as senior policy makers and industry participants.
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The intergovernmental fintech working group (IFWG) is the premiere forum for fintech discussions on the intersection of industry and policy in South Africa. It brings together over 200 industry participants and government officials and so far has been sponsored by the South African Reserve Bank. Home to the South African Research Chair, the Financial Innovation Hub will host the annual IFWG meetings in Cape Town.
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Furthermore, the Hub organises ad-hoc industry and policy workshops on specific topics such as practitioner workshops with industry experts which will provide a great environment to build networks.

News from around the Hub

From Research to Innovation: Harnessing DePIN to Bridge Africa's Digital Divide
From research to practical applications, DePIN is showing great promise in bridging the continent's digital divide.Our article delves into the challenges of connectivity in Africa, the innovative potential of DePIN, and real-world applications. Discover how the Hub is leading this transformation through cutting-edge research and initiatives like blockchain-enabled weather index crop insurance.
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EcoChain: Pioneering Blockchain-Enabled ESG Compliance with MPhil FinTech Class
The 2023 MPhil in Financial Technology (FinTech) class has developed EcoChain, a blockchain-enabled Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) compliance tracking platform
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GenesisBloc Launchpad
We're proud to announce the launch of our first pre-incubator programme, GenesisBloc. In collaboration with SENSE, facilitated by the Swiss Embassy, the programme spans from August 2023 to June 2024. This 10-month pre-incubation journey is dedicated to supporting and enabling the success of up to four student-led innovation projects.
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FINHUB HACK SERIES I 2023
The University of Cape Town Financial Innovation Hub (FinHub) is excited to announce the upcoming FinHub Hack Series I 2023. The FinHub Hack Series is a recurring Web 3.0-focused hackathon that provides a nurturing environment for participants to develop solutions on the Algorand blockchain without the typical hackathon time constraints, enabling them to create more realistic and sustainable solutions.
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Blockchain Africa Conference 2023
The FinHub team recently attended the ninth edition of the Blockchain Africa Conference in Johannesburg. The conference has been attended by more than 9000 individuals from 160 countries since its inception in 2015, making it one of the most prominent blockchain-oriented conferences on the continent.
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UZH Blockchain Center
Bingle Kruger, a PhD student in Computer Science from UCT, is spending six months at the University of Zürich (UZH) Blockchain Center on an exchange.
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Introducing: Practitioner Seminars
This series was created to expose our students to exceptional individuals in the African Fintech space working on innovative solutions to address the large unbanked population on our continent. Because it has attracted so much interest from students across campus outside the Fintech Masters degree, we've decided to open up attendance to all students interested in fintech and related topics.
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Ace Conference 2023
In January 2023, the inaugural ACE Conference was held at Hotel Arts in Barcelona, allowing ACE teams to present their work, collaborate and network. As one of the lead recipients of the ACE programme in Africa, the FinHub team and three graduate students were invited to attend the conference.
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Decipher 2022
As part of the annual study tour, the FinHub team and the MPhil in FinTech students attended the highly anticipated Decipher 2022 conference held by Algorand in Dubai from November 28-30, 2022.
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Media Coverage

See what others have to say about FinHub :)

Failure to launch: South Africa’s challenge in transforming technical talent into investable founders

techcabal

Blockchain solution to contested elections

UCT News

Research Papers

Research by our resident PostDocs, colleagues and students.
International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues
Estimating Value at Risk and Expected Shortfall: A Kalman Filter Approach
Article link

Max van der Lecq1 and Gary van Vuuren2

1School of Economics, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa
2Centre for Business Mathematics and Informatics, North-West University, Potchefstroom, 2351, South Africa.

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Max van der Lecq is part of the MPhil in Fintech Class of 2022. This article originates from his masters thesis supervised by Prof. Gary van Vuuren.
Proceedings of the 57th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences | 2024
The Dynamic Effects of Blockchain-based Identity Management Adoption on Data Breaches
Article link

Sarah Mulombo Mulaji1, Irwin Brown2 and Sumarie Roodt3

1University of Cape Town
2University of Cape Town
3University of Cape Town

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Sarah Mulambo Mulaji is a PostDoc Researcher primarily interested in information & cyber security management and emerging technologies, especially blockchain applications and their impact on organisations and society.
Rosa Luxembourg Stiftung
When Finance Meets Big Data
Article link

Fabio de Masi

Research Fellow at the UCT Financial Innovation Hub

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Fabio De Masi is a former MEP and MP for Die Linke, where he was vice chair of the parliamentary group and its spokesperson on financial affairs. He is currently a research fellow with the Financial Innovation Hub of the University of Cape Town in South Africa.
Our newsletters serve to showcase events and achievements in the FinHub ecosystem. Read our latest issue below or on LinkedIn.

Publications

FinHub Annual Report
Algorand CBDC Report

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Once a quarter, we update you on everything that FinHub and all the fun things our affiliates have been up to. You can also now find the past editions of our newsletter in our resources section.
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