David Cameron is going big on fintech

David Cameron is on a trade mission to South East Asia right now, and he's banging the drum for Britain's fintech industry.

The Prime Minister is throwing his weight behind a new fintech manifesto from trade body Innovate Finance, published on Thursday, and is holding a roundtable in Indonesia to coincide with the manifesto's release.

The roundtable features representatives from top British firms like mobile payment specialist Monitise, peer-to-peer lender Ratesetter, bitcoin wallet provider Blockchain, and online business loan provider iwoca.

The companies are all part of a crop of British businesses using technology to do financial services faster and cheaper thank traditional operators. Most have sprung up since the 2008 recession, thanks to a combination of technological advances, redundancies at big banks, and a distrust of traditional lenders among consumers.

David Cameron said in an emailed statement on Thursday: "This government wants the UK to be the leading FinTech centre in the world, that's why, at the Summer Budget, we appointed a Special Envoy for this fast growing sector."

Well-known London technology investor Eileen Burbidge was named Special Envoy for fintech in the recent budget.

Innovate Finance's manifesto calls for the creation of 100,000 new fintech jobs by 2020, in part through the creation of apprenticeships and fintech degree courses. That's almost double the current total of 135,000 fintech jobs in Britain.

Commenting on this, Cameron said in the statement: "I'm pleased that Innovate Finance's manifesto has set such ambitious goals including the creation of 100,000 jobs. This will ensure we are a world leader in the development of financial services technologies."