Dynamics of fintech terms in news and blogs and specialization of companies of the fintech industry

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the evolution and distribution of fintech terms in news, blogs, and company descriptions worldwide, revealing how fintech companies are geographically and sectorally specialized through complex network analysis.

Contribution

It introduces a large-scale analysis of fintech terminology dynamics and applies complex network methods to uncover geographical and sectoral over-expressions in fintech companies.

Findings

Fintech terms have evolved into a coherent global set.

Companies with fintech terms show over-expressions in location and sector attributes.

Geographical and economic over-expressions are detected in fintech company distributions.

Abstract

We perform a large scale analysis of a list of fintech terms in (i) news and blogs in English language and (ii) professional descriptions of companies operating in many countries. The occurrence and co-occurrence of fintech terms and locutions shows a progressive evolution of the list of fintech terms in a compact and coherent set of terms used worldwide to describe fintech business activities. By using methods of complex networks that are specifically designed to deal with heterogeneous systems, our analysis of a large set of professional descriptions of companies shows that companies having fintech terms in their description present over-expressions of specific attributes of country, municipality, and economic sector. By using the approach of statistically validated networks, we detect geographical and economic over-expressions of a set of companies related to the multi-industry, geographically and economically distributed fintech movement.