*By Michael Teich*
Amazon inked a new partnership with American Express, but don't expect the financial industry to be the next area the tech giant jumps into.
"The thing that people misunderstand is that tech companies don't want to manufacture financial products," said Lex Sokolin, Global Director of Fintech Strategy at Autonomous Research. "It's about making the ecosystem and the platform more powerful, and finance is just a feature inside of that."
American Express announced Tuesday it will launch a co-branded Amazon credit card for small businesses. The move accelerates Amazon's foray into financial products and strengthens its position as a lender. The goal, Sokolin said, is to enable small businesses to finance their activities, getting more products on Amazon's platform, and ultimately driving more commerce.
Plus, the opportunity costs of devoting itself to the financial industry are too high.
"Amazon has tremendous high-growth, super interesting, blue oceans to explore,” he said. "They could be investing in building a mortgage business, or they can build artificial intelligence business."
For the full segment, [click here.](https://cheddar.com/videos/amazon-bolsters-financial-prowess-with-new-credit-card)
Following Russia's incursion into Ukraine, the U.S. is warning businesses and major banks to brace themselves for cyberattacks. Lester Munson, a senior fellow at the National Security Institute, joined Cheddar News to break down what this means for financial institutions “So we need to be concerned about not just intentional Russian hacks against American entities but also what Russia is doing in Ukraine. Those things can impact us as well," he said
Booking Holdings reported a successful Q4 earnings despite being directly impacted by the pandemic. As travel ramps back up for summer 2022, the company is hoping to fully recover from pandemic losses. CEO Glenn Fogel joined Cheddar News to discuss the report and the company's excitement for this travel season. "We're actually looking ahead of where we were in 2019 at the same time for the summer bookings, which shows how much demand there really is for travel right now," he said.
After weeks of talks and posturing in hopes of staving off an attack, Russia invaded Ukraine on Thursday, an incident that has already impacted the global economy, including the U.S.. Jason McMann, head of geopolitical risk analysis for Morning Consult, joined Cheddar’s Closing Bell to break down what investors might do to prepare themselves as the crisis continues. "I think there are a few things that we have our eye on over at Morning Consult that could cause the situation to become a bit more severe or unstable as far as market outcomes would be concerned," McMann said. "One of those things would be if the U.S. and the EU kind of moved in concerted fashion to block Russia from the SWIFT transaction system. So, I would say that's one thing that would be worth keeping an eye on."
Tom and Darr Aley, Co-Founders of Aidentified, join Cheddar Innovates to discuss how the platform is becoming the next social network for companies to make connections in an increasingly digital world.
Cloud-based marketing technology firm, Zeta Global reported strong Q4 earnings after the bell on Wednesday, with revenue up 18 percent. David Steinberg, CEO and co-founder, joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss the company's big results, how marketers are turning to its first-party tech solutions and its plans for future growth. "We raised our guidance pretty dramatically for this year," he said. "We publicly announced our Zeta 2025 plan, which we have been focused on internally since 2020 but to get to over a billion dollars in revenue per year and a 20 percent operating margin by 2025."
Ahon Sarkar, General Manager of Helix, breaks down how personalizing banking products leads to more customer retention and outlines the future of customization among brands.
The real estate market is only continuing to heat up as home prices skyrocket across the country. The median price for an American home jumped nearly 20 percent in a year, with the number of 'million dollar cities' tripling since 2020. Tim Rood, Situs AMC Managing Director joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
