InMarketing Today

Wise shares fell 15% today after Belgian prosecutors confirmed an investigation into roughly €500m in transactions flagged across more than 30 European countries for suspected money laundering, fraud and corruption (Source: City AM, 1 Jun 2026). The probe, first reported by The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, follows a $4.2m US compliance penalty settled last year — and centres on whether Wise’s Brussels office failed to comply with anti-money laundering laws. For a brand whose entire product is trust in a money transfer, the communications damage is as immediate as the legal exposure: the market priced that in the moment the news broke.

Evelyn Partners has confirmed that chief executive Paul Geddes and chief financial officer Alex Gersh will step down when NatWest’s acquisition completes — expected this summer (Source: Money Marketing, 1 Jun 2026). Chris Kenny, who has spent nearly 29 years at the firm and its predecessor Smith & Williamson, will take on the top role, reporting to NatWest’s Emma Crystal. Choosing an internal leader of that tenure is a deliberate communications decision: in wealth management, where client relationships are everything, continuity of faces matters almost as much as continuity of strategy.

Fintech firms grew at four times the pace of traditional financial services in 2025 — averaging 22% revenue growth, with the UK leading Europe at 30% and global sector revenues hitting $500bn, according to BCG’s Global Fintech Report 2026 (Source: City AM, 1 Jun 2026). M&A deal volumes jumped to $251bn from $184bn the prior year, with fintechs now acquiring other fintechs more often than incumbents are acquiring them. The caveat: fintech IPOs have trailed the broader sector by 24 percentage points in annual total shareholder returns, because public investors are still asking hard questions about compliance maturity and the durability of growth — a capital markets communications problem as much as a financial one.

More than 100 European startup founders — including those behind Revolut, Wayve and ElevenLabs — have joined Balderton Capital’s ‘Built in Europe’ campaign, arguing the continent’s tech sector has already reached a scale most critics continue to underestimate (Source: City AM, 1 Jun 2026). Europe’s tech sector is now worth $6.7tn and accounts for 15% of GDP, up from 4% a decade ago. “Built in Europe aims to shift the conversation from potential to proof,” said Suranga Chandratillake, general partner at Balderton Capital — which is a precise description of what good marketing does.

Deloitte UK has appointed Hayley McKelvey as its first chief AI officer, placing the role on the firm’s UK Executive team as part of a push to become “the leading AI-enabled professional services firm in the UK” under new chief executive Darren Graves (Source: City AM, 1 Jun 2026). McKelvey, who has been at Deloitte for more than 20 years, will lead AI strategy across both client services and internal operations — with three further roles added to the Executive. The appointment is itself a communications act: placing AI at the Executive level sends clients a clear signal that this is a strategic commitment, not a technology experiment buried in an innovation lab.

Meta is forecast to overtake Google in global digital advertising revenue in 2026 — projecting $243bn against Google’s $239bn, the first time in the history of digital advertising that Google will not lead the market, according to eMarketer (Source: Marketing Dive). The driver is Meta’s Advantage+ AI automation engine, which delivers approximately 41% higher blended return on ad spend and has reached a $60bn annualised run rate. For B2B financial services and fintech marketers who have historically leaned on search and LinkedIn, this is a structural signal: the dominant paid media channel is shifting, and Meta’s scale across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp now creates a reach and return profile that is hard to ignore.