The conference desk

A large share of what actually moves in this industry is said out loud at a conference before it appears in a filing. We treat event coverage as a beat rather than an afterthought, and we plan it several months ahead.

Below is the calendar we work from: the full set of events on our beats across North America, Europe and Asia, with our actual position on each one. Rows tagged Attended are editions the desk was physically at. Confirmed means we will be at the next edition. Requested means accreditation is with the organiser and undecided.

We publish the whole calendar rather than only the flattering parts, because a coverage calendar that lists only successes is not a calendar.

Coverage calendar

• 28 events tracked across 3 regions
• 8 attended
• 3 confirmed for the coming season
• 1 accreditation requested

North America

Europe & UK

Asia

How we choose

We can only be in one place at a time, so the selection is deliberate. In rough order of weight:

1. Practitioner density. How much of the programme is people who operate something, rather than people who sell to them.
2. Supervisory presence. Regulators and central banks on the agenda usually mean genuinely new information. See why we weight this so heavily.
3. Beat fit. Payments infrastructure, embedded finance, banking technology, institutional digital assets, regtech.
4. Access. Whether accredited press can reach speakers and closed sessions, or only the main stage.
5. Reader overlap. Whether the people in the room are the people who read us.

The six event archetypes we sort the circuit into, and what each is good for, are set out in The fintech conference circuit, mapped. Our method for reading an agenda before committing is here.

What our coverage looks like

Every event we cover gets the same three-part treatment, and we publish the critical half as readily as the positive one.

Before: the preview. What the agenda is actually asking, which sessions carry information and which are sponsored, and the questions we intend to put to speakers.

During: dispatches. The sessions that produced something new: a confirmed timeline, a candid operational account, a disagreement worth recording. We do not write up every keynote.

After: what worked and what didn't. A verdict piece. What the event got right, what the agenda avoided, whether the practitioner-to-vendor ratio held up, and whether it was worth the ticket. Organisers get named for both.

That last format is the house style, and we apply it consistently. An organiser considering accreditation should expect fair coverage, specific criticism, and no promises about the conclusion.

For organisers and press offices

If you run an event on this calendar, or one that should be on it, send the event name, dates, city, accreditation deadline and a link to the agenda to press@fintechsdispatch.com.

What we ask for, what we produce, and the conditions we will not accept are set out on the press and accreditation page. What we think press programmes get right and wrong is here.

For sponsors and exhibitors

Sponsors frequently hold press and guest passes and decide who uses them. If you sponsor an event on this calendar and would like the desk in the room, we are straightforward to work with: we will tell you in advance what we intend to cover, we will name the event and its sponsors accurately, and we will not promise you coverage of your own announcements in exchange for the pass.

That last point is deliberate. A publication that trades passes for coverage is worth nothing to the sponsor who reads it. Details on the partner page.