MarketWatch’s second annual Best New Ideas in Money
By
I tried to buy a cup of coffee in China but couldn’t speak the language.
I don’t mean Mandarin. For that, I spent a few months learning enough phrases to make passable, if poorly pronounced, small talk. No, I’m talking about the other language barrier: money.
“You have to know languages when you go to sell something,” wrote Gabriel García Márquez. “But when you go to buy, everyone does what he must to understand you.” It turns out he was wrong — though, in fairness, his Nobel Prize wasn’t in economics.
There is no universal language of money. Our financial system is more a Tower of Babel, built in conflicting dialects that cause unnecessary friction and confusion. But, like languages, money evolves, continuously reshaped by a mixing of cultures and by new technologies and ideas.
That is one of the key themes that comes through this, our second annual Best New Ideas in Money, a series that explores the financial innovations changing the way we live, work, save and invest.
So what has this got to do with the price of coffee in China?
The use of better data and algorithms is streamlining transactions that long required professional intermediaries like brokers, lawyers and other translators.
Andrea Riquier, for instance, looks at how new tech could make buying and selling a home, one of the most fraught financial transactions, as simple as buying and selling shares of company stock.
And Emily Bary examines how advances in language-translation technology could make money flow faster around the globe by enabling small businesses to deal internationally.
Those are just a few examples of the fascinating pieces that will be published over the next few weeks. Please let me know what you think — and where I can get a decent cup of joe around here.
Here are the first stories in the series:
Leslie Albrecht: How a mix of psychotherapy and financial advice could solve your money issues once and for all
William Watts: The explosion of ‘alternative’ data gives regular investors access to tools previously employed only by hedge funds
Quentin Fottrell: The technology that should finally make your wallet obsolete
Chris Matthews: Why the coming recession could force the Federal Reserve to swap greenbacks for digital dollars
Jillian Berman: How wiping out $1.5 trillion in student debt would boost the economy
Andrea Riquier: Why buying and selling a house could soon be as simple as trading stocks
Emily Bary: How new translation technology is opening financial floodgates around the world
Jonathan Burton: Forcing companies to share the wealth with employees could save capitalism
Join the conversation