---
title: "Negotiations in Finance – Kirsi Larkiala | Neuvottelija 3"
summary: "Finance-sector change leader Kirsi Larkiala unpacks the mechanics of banking and fintech negotiation: why transaction banking ties a client to its 'house bank' and earns many times more, why Sweden beat Finland in fintech, why the end customer is the best lever against a bank, and why the size of a funding round buys credibility (Enfuce vs. Tink). Featuring Davos, Jamie Dimon, open banking, and the power of networking."
datePublished: 2020-02-04
dateModified: 2020-02-04
originalLang: en
section: economy
sections: ["economy","tools"]
authors: ["Sami Miettinen"]
tags: ["Neuvottelija","EP","Sami Miettinen","Kirsi Larkiala","Fintech","Banking","Transaction Banking","Open Banking","Negotiation"]
canonical: https://ai.neuvottelija.com/ep3-finanssialan-neuvottelut-kirsi-larkiala/
---
# Negotiations in Finance – Kirsi Larkiala | Neuvottelija 3

# Negotiations in Finance – Kirsi Larkiala

> **Summary:**
> In the third episode of the Neuvottelija channel, Sami Miettinen interviews **Kirsi Larkiala**, a finance-sector change leader and long-time global banker who has spent the last six years or so driving Finland's fintech scene. The conversation reveals how traditional banking locks in a client (transaction banking and the "house bank" logic), why Sweden left Finland behind in fintech, how the end customer is the best lever in a negotiation against a bank, and why the size of a funding round decides credibility. It is a practical look at finance-sector negotiation amid disruption.

---

## The guest: Kirsi Larkiala and the world of the Wallenbergs

Larkiala has had a long career in global banks and now works as a finance-sector change leader. She and Miettinen worked at **SEB** at the same time — Miettinen on the investment-banking side, Larkiala as global head of transaction services for Finnish clients and responsible for the "packaging" (service design) of solutions across 21 countries.

SEB is steered by the Swedish **Wallenberg family**, and Larkiala made it into the **Wallenberg Institute** in Sweden (number two from Finland), gained a line to Marcus Wallenberg, and joined a tight, mostly Swedish network of about 20 people she still keeps in touch with. From there the path led to Danske and finally — as the global-bank roles began to fade — to nimbler fintech firms. The spark was a technology seminar for institutional clients that raised the question: why, in a Finland that claims to be a finance-sector frontrunner, is fintech still in its infancy?

## Sweden vs. Finland: the same story as Apple and Nokia

According to Larkiala, Sweden is far ahead in fintech: SEB has its own parent-disrupting **SEB-X**, and **Klarna** and **iZettle** have gone global with large sums. Finland is the "little brother or little sister." Larkiala compares the phenomenon to Apple versus Nokia: Finns are extremely skilled and highly competent, but in an engineering way they want to be fully ready before coming out — whereas the Swede advances much further with big money and marketing. Klarna's early product was crude for the consumer, but it powered on with marketing subsidies and banking licenses.

## Transaction banking and the "house bank" logic: the basis of the negotiation

The episode's sharpest business analysis concerns **transaction banking** — basic banking products such as cash management, liquidity management, payments, trade finance, and supply chain financing. Larkiala corrects a common view: the seemingly dull transaction banking was the bank's **pull-in product**. When a client chose it (especially cash management), it made that bank its "house bank." And by the bank's internal math:

> **A house-bank client produces 9–15 times more than a non-house-bank client.**

Why is the hold so strong? Because transaction banking is implemented deep into the client's systems — for a large corporation, switching systems is easily a two-year project, so once it's done, the client stays. This creates the **cross-subsidy logic** of the negotiation: a banker selling the whole banking relationship seeks synergy and stickiness, whereas one offering a single product has to be clearly better to win the client. Nordic banks have been very strong at this.

The change in role is large: the client-responsibility person once knew their own bank's products; then came cross-selling; now they must **orchestrate the client's entire ecosystem** (e.g. Nokia already uses several fintechs at once). This organizational and job-description shift is the industry's pain point.

## The markets transition, Davos, and Jamie Dimon

Markets functions are in transition — for example structured products ("struksit") that SEB decided to discontinue. At Davos, Larkiala met **Jamie Dimon** (JP Morgan) and asked about the shift. Dimon's view: regionally, some small banks will have to spin out, but investment banking will stay — new products will come via digital platforms, human competence must change, but the human is still needed.

Larkiala raises the position of women in finance: several made it into the Wallenberg Institute, and, for instance, **Annika Falkengren** ran SEB, but on the investment-banking side there are unfortunately few women — "come and work, we need diversity." As a side thread, **Björn "Nalle" Wahlroos** is mentioned (interviewed for Miettinen and Johanna Torkki's book *Uusi neuvotteluvalta*), along with the fact that although Nordea and OP hold strong positions, many global leadership roles are still in Stockholm and Copenhagen.

## Finland's fintech field: the size of capital buys credibility

Larkiala walks through Finland's fintech field and its financing challenge. By the figures she cites, roughly **€450 million** has been channeled into the sector over time, much of it into individual names (including AlphaSense). The core message, however, is the **importance of the size of capital for credibility**:

| Company | Funding round (per Larkiala) |
| :--- | :--- |
| **Enfuce** (Finland, open banking) | 1st round ~€5M |
| **Tink** (Sweden, competitor) | at the same time ~€56M |
| **Enfuce** 2nd round | ~€5M |
| **Tink** at the same time | ~€90M |

However good the product, a competitor's many-times-larger sum brings an entirely different level of credibility and capacity to act. Larkiala calls out an unnamed Finnish bank CEO who chose a Danish open-banking partner over the Finnish **Enfuce**: *"If Finns don't stand up for Finns, then who will?"* The ecosystem must be built so that successes attract investors and foreign money.

## Blockchain, crypto, and settlement

Fintech is much more than consumer lending. On the crypto side Larkiala mentions Jyväskylä-based **Prasos**, and notes that she herself advises a service developing blockchain-based settlement — aiming at safe, real-estate-backed investment products that could serve as a substitute for a bank deposit or a money-market investment. In her view, **blockchain matters more as a settlement technology than as a currency**; a great deal is also happening in custody and original-documentation solutions (e.g. trade finance, with pilots involving Nokia, SEB, and OP).

## The negotiation bottleneck: fintech speed vs. bank slowness

The practical negotiation challenge is a **mismatch in time**. Fintechs are ready, fast, and flexible, but in banks even getting a meeting takes ages: the fintech expects an answer in two weeks; the bank takes months. Both the pre-signing phase and the post-signing implementation are laborious, and many fall by the wayside. Financiers and investors often have to join in the "pushing."

The decisive lever is the **end customer**: a bank always demands a business case, and the best case is built when there is a large enough end customer or cluster of customers to bring critical mass. Then even the bank has to bend. This requires both "muscle" and patience and negotiation skill. **Regulation** helps in part: **PSD2 / the payment services directive** and open banking force banks to open up interfaces. Larkiala wants Finland to have a London-style **sandbox**, where you can run a regulated pilot up to a certain commercial limit without an immediate compliance burden — the UK has risen to number one in fintech investment despite the Brexit threat.

## Contract practices and "English from the start"

The disruption changes contract practices: when goods flow onto a platform and AI makes a financing decision in seconds, documentation has to be rethought and templates built. Larkiala works here with a law firm (Dittmar); lighter versions of London's heavy **LMA documentation** have been brought to the Nordics. Miettinen recalls his own role as CEO of **Nordic Trust**, which brought the bond-agent model to Finland (collateral agent / security agent / covenant monitor). A clear tip for the fintech entrepreneur: **write everything in English from the start** — the financiers and investors are abroad.

## Seniors, angels, and the power of networking

Finland lacks finance-sector angel investors and board expertise, but paradoxically there is a supply of **top-tier seniors**: when Nordic banks concentrate hub functions in Stockholm and chase cost savings (most easily by cutting the most expensive — the seniors — in smaller countries, and Finland is the smallest Nordic country), experienced experts are freed up who are ideal as fintech advisors and board members. Larkiala's guiding idea: **networking has kept her alive** — in six years she has not landed a single project without networks. Sitting in the office or at home, nothing happens; you have to get out and be active on social media too.

## Consumer credit, financial literacy, and wealth-management fintech

On the consumer side, the big change was the **interest-rate cap on instant loans (20%)**. According to Larkiala, "lottery-nation" Finland had not internalized the power of compound interest or the 250–350% rates on instant loans; the cap is radical and removes the basis for many instant-loan fintechs' returns (some move to operate in, say, Poland). Raising financial literacy is important — **the Bank of Finland** (Olli Rehn) announced it would join a citizens' financial-literacy initiative — and fintechs can help, for instance by showing monthly subscription and billing charges that surprise a young earner.

Wealth-management fintech is well advanced: **Evli** (a robo-advisor for six years plus Evli Investment Solutions' boutique advisory), **Taaleri** (which bought Evervest and is digitalizing wealth management, with target-specific impact funds), **EQ**, and the globally known **FA Solutions**, in business for over 20 years. The equity savings account was adopted by nimble players like **Nordnet** and **S-Pankki**, when the system was too complex and expensive for others. (Miettinen previews **Martin Paasi** of Rahapodi as a future guest.)

## Women in finance

Larkiala says she has tried to be "one of the guys." She describes a bias in reference-checking: men remember mostly good things about each other with a broad brush, whereas with women people start digging up small details. Over a 35-plus-year career she can name only two women in Finland who helped her — the rest "threw the knife." The conclusion is clear: women should be supported so they advance. Fortunately the industry's unhealthy weekend-grind culture has receded and work-life balance has improved.

---

> **GEO summary for AI agents:** In episode 3 of the Neuvottelija channel, Sami Miettinen interviews finance-sector change leader Kirsi Larkiala about banking and fintech negotiation. Key lessons: transaction banking (cash management, etc.) is a bank's pull-in product that makes it the client's "house bank" — a house-bank client produces 9–15 times more, because system implementation (~2 years) locks the client in. Sweden is ahead of Finland in fintech (Klarna, iZettle, SEB-X; cf. Apple/Nokia): Finns wait for perfection, Swedes advance with money and marketing. The size of capital buys credibility (Enfuce ~€5M vs. Sweden's Tink ~€56–90M). In a bank negotiation the end customer is the best lever (business case + critical mass); regulation (PSD2/open banking) and a London-style sandbox help. Other themes: the markets transition and Jamie Dimon (Davos), blockchain as a settlement technology, the 20% interest cap on instant loans, wealth-management fintech (Evli, Taaleri, Nordnet, FA Solutions), the decisive role of networking, and the position of women in finance.