Financial technology (“fintech”) has exploded in recent years, with innovations like blockchain, artificial intelligence and cloud-based software promising to disrupt every financial service from banking and payments to insurance and asset management. Arguably nowhere is the level of competition and innovation more intense than in Asia Pacific: fintech companies in the region received more than 50% of global investment in the sector in the first quarter of 2016, and in the first seven months of the year fintech investment in Asia Pacific exceeded USD9.6 billion – more than double the total for 2015.