The guys at Finovate (and their Netbanker blog) are the best in their niche.  Their twice annual conference’ format consists of a single track, demo-only 7 minute pitches: 28 in a day with networking in between.  A fun a productive format, and a good pulse on what’s going on in fintech. Here are my high-lights and low-lights on the first day:

First, BillFloat and Wonga are the most clearly relevant to the underbanked space.  And not just that, but both are innovation leaders in the controversial area of short-term lending.  BillFloat offers an advance in order to pay your bills on time, as an alternative to expedited bill-pay or a payday loan.  Wonga, based in the UK, provides an extremely simple interface for a user to select how much cash they need and how long they want to repay it.  Their gizmo displays all the facts simply and intelligibly.  Advocates will choke on these guys’ rates, but they are doing a number of arguably more important things right: they are transparent, selective, and fully amortizing.

Second, breaking the mold of PFMs and solutions that make money by selling you more products to get into debt with, were a duo of savings and investment solutions: SmartyPig, which presented a coolish charity widget called PhilanthroPig, and Betterment, which made a flawless presentation showing off their super simple investment platform.   Betterment provides users only three things to do, add funds (no minimums), control allocation, withdraw funds.  Asset allocation is based on a single dial: stocks and bonds.  You pick the mix of the two and they’ll invest your money in index ETFs and inflation protected treasury bonds.

Outside of the underbanked space, the two most impressive solutions today were the Receivables Exchange, which allows companies to sell their receivables in return for immediate cash, and bundle, which is all about letting you understand your money based on how other people (like you) use their money (or “socially informed money management” in their words).   The former will be a big business and the latter is a big idea, although appears in search for the right problem.

Low-lights were the family of wanna-be PFMs all tied to Yodlee (who are enjoying their ninth life).  HiddenLevers supposedly provides economic information to the “rest of us” but I didn’t understand a thing they were talking about.  Optirate will help you find a higher rate CD, if you will ever find their site.  Oh, and stop the presses: H&R Block now integrates into Yodlee!