The Foreign Exchange market or Forex is a global decentralized market where currencies from across the globe trade. A foreign exchange transaction involves exchange of one currency with another by the counter parties to the transaction. From Importers to Exporters, Business travellers to Leisure Travellers, Established companies to SMEs and medical tourists to students, seamless, transparent, low cost and single click Forex transaction was more of a dream or a desire, untill disruption approached this space. With new disruptive technologies and entry of more enablers in this sector, a lot of customer desires and dreams were fulfilled. Year 2018 is now all set to take these experiences and expectations to a completely new level.

Over decades forex in India remained under the dark ages due to monopoly of nationalised banks, private sector banks and intermediaries. This monopoly resulted in conventional methods of dealing in forex transactions and encouraged hidden costs, complex processes and overcharged fees. In last 3-4 years, few first movers stepped in and accepted the challenge to break the barriers around a profitable and satisfactory foreign exchange. Challenging the anarchy of conventional practices and cloudy approaches, disruption took its first step towards the development of an advance ecosystem.

Year 2017 offered seamless opportunities to customers by providing more transparency, ease of forex transactions, credible platforms to watch every single penny of their hard earn money and low cost transactions. Riding on these tech enabled platforms, business communities earned better profit margins, medical tourists in need of immediate attention were able to experience hassle free transactions, business or leisure travellers spent more on new experiences than transaction fees and students with their dreams to study abroad successfully saved some money for future expenses on a foreign land.

I am hopeful that 2018 has a lot in its kitty for Forex. Foreign exchange sector in our country is aggressively going to join the fintech revolution and will create new avenues for customer experiences. Inspired with the developments till 2017, next year will see more passionate innovators entering the space to take the next leap. New trends will rise to enhance awareness, trust and overall customer satisfaction.

Forex on the move: With the advent of new smartphone technologies, on-the-go transactions will be high on demand. World class apps loaded with unique features like currency alerts, online risk management, research reports, real time updates, rate checks and audits will help customers in instant transactions at a reduced cost. Emergence of virtual customer assistants will enhance the capability of sales and customer services.

Next Gen Forex Market: Disruptive technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI), machine learning, block chain, cloud etc will totally transform the way people interact with foreign exchange market. From traditional algorithm based systems the sector will move to advance techniques creating efficient systems and processes that will automatically learn, predict and modify to make the functionality seamless and impactful for customers.

Emergence of effective security designs: Growing engagement of customers with digital platforms and connected devices will create the demand for adaptive security designs and solutions. Empowered with smart intelligence and innovative application architectures, IoT platforms will become more secured giving a sigh of relief to customers on their transactions and information exchange.

Ecosystem to become more robust and tech enabled: This coming year will also witness the elevated level of a robust and advance forex ecosystem equipped with modern practices, fast track solutions and superior level of customer services. The forex ecosystem will become more efficient, reliable and secure with this tech disruption.

Digital avenues as key enablers: With digital going mainstream, organisations in this sector will largely adapt the modern practices in IoT, Analytics, customer experience and information systems to achieve their goal of establishing a flawless digital business.

These trends will pave the way for very high standards of excellence in the Foreign Exchange sector.