PRESS RELEASE: Announcing the launch of FinTech Australia, an Association for Australian FinTech Startups

Today Federal Treasurer Scott Morrison MP formally announced the launch of a FinTech Advisory Group to work with the government on financial services policy reform. This represents the culmination of many months of effort by members of the FinTech community, who have worked with the government, and Treasury in particular, to make FinTech a national priority.Concurrently we are announcing the formation of FinTech Australia, a new industry body representing Australias vibrant Financial Technology (FinTech) Startup community and the launch of our position paper Priorities for Reform of the Australian Financial Services Industry.FinTech Australia provides a united voice for FinTech Startups in Australia, and will focus on building a coordinated reform agenda, raising the profile of Australian FinTech startups and generating an ecosystem of partners here and abroad to enable Australian FinTech Startups to compete on a global scale.Over 30 FinTech Startups, Hubs, Venture Capital Funds and Accelerators working across lending, crowd funding, robo advice, payments, insurance, financial markets and bitcoin have signed up as founding members of FinTech Australia. Founding members include: Acorns Grow Australia, Apex Capital Partners, Banjo Loans, Best Exchange Rates, Brighte, CheckVault, Clover, Coinjar, CrowdFundUp, Equitise, Financial Ask, Fincast, FundX, H2 Ventures, Huffle, CapitalU, Macrovue, Manning Asset Management, MoneyBrilliant, MoneyPlace, Moula, OnMarket Book Builds, RateSetter Australia, Reinventure Group, SelfWealth, SocietyOne, Spotcap, Stockspot, Stone&Chalk, Thincats Australia, Timelio, Tyro Fintech Hub and Yodlee.The FinTech Australia Reform Position Paper released today was developed in close consultation with the Australian FinTech community. FinTech Australia welcomes the launch of the governments Fintech Advisory Group and will work closely with it to ensure the needs of FinTech startups are heard, and that policy reform is undertaken with the objective of making Australia a globally competitive FinTech ecosystem.Simon Cant, Managing Director and Co-Founder at Reinventure Group, said, Australia has a world-leading financial services sector with four of the top 20 banks and the third largest retirement savings pool globally. Of all Australian industries financial services represents the largest GDP contributor, at around $130B or 9%, the largest tax contributor, at around $11B or 18%, and a major employer providing around 420,000 jobs. With FinTech investment accelerating 200% globally to US$12B in 2014, Australia has the talent, capability and capital to be the leading FinTech market. If we dont seize that opportunity, we face the risk of lost jobs, GDP and tax revenue to the global tech giants, as was the case with the disruption of the media industry where around 50% of digital media revenue has been cededto Google and Facebook. We welcome todays announcement as a first step in building a world-leading FinTech environment.Charlotte Petris, founder of Timelio, said Were pleased and excited to be a founding member of FinTech Australia. The Association will provide us a strong voice and vital networks and resources to grow, as well as providing a vehicle to help champion the success of FinTech ventures like Timelio.Jonny Wilkinson, co-founder of Equitise, said Through the association, we can build even greater consumer awareness and confidence in Australian FinTechs as a viable alternative to traditional financial services products. We are proud to be working together on the formation of FinTech Australia, and on ways to drive the evolution of our FinTech ecosystem.Alex Scandurra, CEO of Stone and Chalk, said Its great to see the FinTech community continuing to come together and really driving Australia to lift its game globally. We have all the ingredients to be a world class centre of FinTech and its imperative for our national prosperity that we take advantage of that. We at Stone & Chalk will continue to nurture, support and accelerate this community and the formation of FinTech Australia and the launch of the governments Advisory Group will multiply that impact.Matt Symons, CEO and Co-founder of SocietyOne, said We are thrilled to see this important initiative come to fruition. Australia has an immediate opportunity to drive financial services reform around credit reporting and other areas of FinTech. We look forward to seeing practical changes that will provide a better deal for Australian consumers, and are confident that this government initiative and FinTech Australia will be key facilitators of that change.Asher Tan, co-Founder and CEO of CoinJar said, We are excited about the creation of FinTech Australia. We, like too many other FinTech companies, have had to look overseas to UK and Asia to find a commercially viable regulatory environment in which to operate.Its time for the government to move on this and make Australia an attractive place to launch FinTech startups, and we welcome the launch of FinTech Australia and the launch of this government advisory group as key drivers of that urgent reform.Jack Quigley, founder of Crowdfundup said, As a leader of the Western Australian FinTech community, its great to see a truly national organization forming representing FinTech innovation from across the country. We look forward to driving a national agenda to make Australia the best place to do FinTech.FinTech Australia will hold its inaugural Annual General Meeting on Thursday 3 March to elect the Associations Management Committee and begin the process for appointing an executive director.-END-About FinTech AustraliaFinTech Australia is a national association for the Australian FinTech Startup community. Our vision is to make Australia the leading market for FinTech in Asia by working with Government, Industry and the Australian FinTech community to create a supportive environment and partner ecosystem in Australia and abroad.Media ContactSimon CantManaging PartnerReinventure GroupPh. 0412 483 621Email: simon@reinventure.com.au