The new year has already brought a spate of eye-catching events. Expect this year’s headlines to be dominated by conflict in the Middle East, insurgency in Hong Kong, Brexit and the re-election (or not) of US president Donald Trump.

Trends, on the other hand, tend to be slow, incremental and harder to grasp. But, as the historian Fernand Braudel argued, trends determine events. Here are three technological trends that I think will shape this decade.

First, Chinese technology will reinvent finance. In the west, investors are excited about fintech, as finance and technology converge to deliver familiar services more efficiently. In China, it might be more accurate to describe the process as techfin: technology is completely redesigning finance from the smartphone user’s perspective. Call it late-mover advantage.