Digital Bank N26 Bolsters European Expansion Efforts with Madrid Operations Hub
N26 announced a new Centre of Excellence in Madrid, its second dedicated operations hub, to support its expanding Spanish workforce and coordinate banking, customer service, and process functions across Europe. The 2,000‑square‑metre facility complements the existing Barcelona tech centre and reinforces N26’s presence in 24 markets. Simultaneously, the Supervisory Board was refreshed, adding veteran banker Stefan Ermisch and removing interim chair Peter Kleinschmidt. These moves highlight N26’s focus on scaling operations while strengthening governance.
Mastercard and Visa Enrich Stablecoin Settlement Capabilities to Supercharge Global Payments in 2026
Mastercard and Visa announced expanded support for stablecoin settlement, enabling tokenized dollar transactions on their networks starting March 2026. The move includes the launch of stablecoin‑backed debit cards that settle directly in digital dollars rather than traditional fiat. By shifting...
Truist’s Dontá Wilson: ‘Innovation without Empathy Is Empty’
Truist’s Chief Consumer and Small Business Banking Officer, Dontá Wilson, highlighted the need for banks to blend digital excellence with genuine human empathy. He explained Truist’s multi‑year growth plan, which leverages AI to enhance both its 20,000‑person workforce and its...
ARQ Raises $70M To Expand Stablecoin Banking In Latin America
ARQ, formerly DolarApp, raised $70 million in a Series B led by Sequoia Capital and Founders Fund. The funding will fuel a rebrand, team expansion, and rollout of new financial products beyond its core stablecoin remittance service. With more than two million...
Amex “Add a Card” Bonus Event: Earn Points for Adding Cards
American Express is relaunching its “Add a Card” bonus event in Canada, running from March 3 to April 30 2026. The promotion introduces a tiered structure where supplementary cardholders earn increasing points or credits based on their first‑three‑month spend. Up to two personal...
Nomba Wants Nigerian Merchants to Collect Pounds Directly From UK Banks
Nomba has teamed with UK Open Banking platform Volume to let Nigerian merchants collect British pounds directly from UK bank accounts, sidestepping traditional card processors and saving 6‑7% of revenue. The integration uses the Faster Payments rail, settles instantly into...
Mortgage Renewal Headwinds Near a ‘Turning Point’ for Pandemic Buyers, Report Says
TD Bank’s latest report signals that the mortgage renewal shock for pandemic‑era borrowers is easing. The household debt‑service ratio dropped to 14.6% in Q3 2025, aided by nearly eight‑percent disposable‑income growth in 2024 and 4.7% in 2025. Homeowners are lengthening amortizations,...
Irish Consumers Amongst European Leaders in Digital Payment Adoption
BearingPoint’s Europe‑wide payment study shows Irish consumers leading digital payment adoption, with 73% regularly using contactless and 62% favoring Revolut for peer‑to‑peer transfers. Cash usage in Ireland fell to 58%, and 24% say they will definitely abandon cash within ten...
Evlo Partners with CreditLadder to Tackle Financial Exclusion and Boost Renters’ Credit Profiles
UK fintech Evlo has announced a partnership with CreditLadder, the country’s leading rent‑reporting platform, to automatically submit renters’ monthly payments to major credit bureaus. The collaboration targets tenants with thin or non‑existent credit files, aiming to convert rent—one of the...
Axis Bank Ties up with Tesla as Preferred EV Financier in India
Axis Bank announced it will serve as Tesla's preferred financing partner in India, becoming the first lender to provide loan tenures up to 10 years for premium electric vehicles. The partnership will roll out across major metros and emerging EV...
Airtel’s SmartCash Hits 3 Million Users in Nigeria’s Mobile Money Push
SmartCash, Airtel Nigeria's payment service bank, reached nearly three million active users, defined by transactions in the past 30 days. The platform offers zero‑fee transfers, bill payments and a 15% annual interest on savings, positioning it against fintech rivals OPay...
Has the Ghanaian Banking Sector Turned the Corner?
Ghana's banking sector is stabilizing as macroeconomic recovery and sweeping reforms take hold. Inflation fell from a record 54.1% in 2022 to 5.4% by early 2026 and the cedi appreciated about 30% while the Bank of Ghana cut its policy...
AIB Plans to Return €2.25bn to Shareholders and More than Quadruple CEO Pay
Allied Irish Banks (AIB) announced a €2.25 bn capital return to shareholders, comprising a €988 m final dividend and a €1 bn share‑buyback approved by regulators. The bank posted a €2.14 bn net profit for 2025, down from the prior year, as net interest...
BNPL Fintech Affirm Shares Insights on Managing Rental Payments
Affirm warns that many renters face predatory BNPL schemes that can charge over 180% APR, turning a simple rent split into costly debt. The fintech highlights its own consumer‑friendly approach, offering a zero‑interest Pay in 4 plan that breaks rent...
Large Greek Banks: Solid F2025 Results Provide Buffers Against Heightened External Risks in 2026
Greek banks Alpha, Eurobank, National Bank of Greece, and Piraeus posted a combined net profit of €4.5 bn in fiscal 2025, a 5% year‑on‑year increase driven by higher fee income and one‑off gains despite net interest income compression. Return on equity...
Which Markets Had the Highest Demand for Renovation Loans?
Renovation loan demand is strongest per capita in New England and Mountain states, with Rhode Island topping the nation at six applications per 1,000 residents. While total home‑improvement loan applications fell 3 % year‑over‑year, transaction volume held steady at $144 billion, driven...
PayPal and TCS Blockchain Modernize Logistics Payments
PayPal and TCS Blockchain have partnered to launch a blockchain‑based payment platform that uses PayPal USD (PYUSD) stablecoin to settle freight invoices. The solution promises same‑day, year‑round settlement and cost reductions of up to 90% compared with traditional invoice factoring....
Zūm Rails Teams Up with Fiserv to Bring In-House Card Acceptance to US and Canadian Businesses
Zūm Rails has partnered with payments‑technology giant Fiserv to become an official payment facilitator, unlocking in‑house credit‑card acceptance for merchants across the United States and Canada. The new capability lets businesses embed fully customized checkout flows directly into their platforms,...
Billtrust Debuts Agentic Credit to Catch Payment Risks
Billtrust announced the Agentic Credit Lines product, an AI‑driven credit risk tool embedded in its AR workflow. It leverages a proprietary network of 13 million buyers and 25 years of B2B payment data to analyze payment history, utilization patterns, and external credit...
Stablecoins Power Philippines’ Thriving Gig Economy
The Philippines’ gig workforce, now about a quarter of employed workers, is turning to stablecoins for cross‑border payouts. Traditional bank transfers can delay payments for days and erode earnings by up to 10% through fees and FX conversion. Stablecoins such...
Lenders' Rent-Stabilized Disappearing Act, By The Numbers
Flagstar Bank, formerly New York Community Bancorp, slashed its rent‑stabilized loan originations from nearly $3.9 billion annually to just $58 million last year, mirroring a broader market contraction. Overall NYC rent‑stabilized financing fell from $27.6 billion in 2019 to under $11.3 billion in 2024,...
HECM Lenders See Subdued Numbers to Start the Year
Government‑backed Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) endorsements dropped 20.7% from January to February, reaching 1,821 transactions, and are down 26.6% year‑over‑year. The slowdown coincides with the rise of proprietary reverse‑mortgage products that offer higher limits and no mortgage‑insurance requirement, drawing...
Stop Payment Fraud Before It Starts
Automated bank account verification protects AP departments from payment fraud. Fraudsters now use AI‑generated emails and deep‑fake audio to hijack bank‑change requests, leading to costly losses. Real‑time verification confirms account ownership, status, and matches supplier data while creating an immutable...
How Nigerian Neobank Kuda Built Its In-House Core Banking Application
Nigerian neobank Kuda, serving over seven million customers, built its own core banking application, NERV, to overcome scalability and reliability limits of a third‑party provider. Starting in 2019 with a modest pre‑seed fund, the engineering‑first team ran NERV in parallel...
Next Steps in Papua New Guinea’s DPI Rollout Include Digital ID for KYC, AI Adoption
Papua New Guinea is advancing its digital public infrastructure (DPI) with a pilot that uses the SevisPass digital ID and SevisWallet app to enable remote KYC for online bank account openings, led by MiBank and the government. The rollout is...
Bank of Japan Expands Blockchain Settlement Sandbox and Says CBDC Efforts Are Ongoing
The Bank of Japan announced an expansion of its blockchain sandbox to experiment with settlement of central bank reserves using tokenized deposits, targeting interbank and securities use cases. Governor Kazuo Ueda said the pilot will test connections to existing systems...
Mutual Funds Take a Shine to Bank Stocks
Mutual funds have markedly increased their stakes in Indian banks, lifting holdings by more than one percentage point in fifteen institutions between December 2024 and December 2025. The Nifty Bank Index climbed 24 percent over the past year, reflecting low NPAs, robust credit growth...
Paysafe Touts a New Wallet And Agentic Commerce As It Navigates 2026
Paysafe reported mixed Q4 2025 results, posting a $25.2 million net loss despite 4% revenue growth to $438.4 million and a 10% rise in transaction volume to $43.9 billion. The company highlighted its new Paysafe Wallet, now available in 18 countries with 500,000 users...
Apple, Google Wallets Get Personal
Digital‑wallet platforms from Apple and Google are evolving beyond simple payments, with startups like Badge turning them into interactive commerce channels. Badge’s infrastructure lets brands push real‑time, location‑aware offers and loyalty updates directly to a consumer’s wallet. The San‑Francisco‑based company...
Payment Friction Wins in Africa
African ecommerce still wrestles with deep‑rooted trust gaps, turning checkout into a conversational process often mediated through WhatsApp. Local platforms like Paystack, Flutterwave, and Egypt’s Fawry have succeeded by offering instant bank transfers, mobile‑money protocols such as STK Push, and cash‑at‑kiosk...
EuroCrowd: Germany’s Investment Crowdfunding Market Remains Partially Realized at Best, Undermines Goal of ECSPR
EuroCrowd warns that Germany’s investment crowdfunding market is only partially aligned with the European Crowdfunding Service Provider Regulation (ECSPR). The country continues to rely on the Vermögensanlagengesetz (VermAnlG) and subordinated‑loan structures, creating a parallel regulatory channel that sidesteps ECSPR. As...
EU: End of Temporary Transition Period for Crypto-Asset Service Providers (CASPs) and Electronic Money Tokens (EMTs)
The European Banking Authority’s temporary relief from full PSD2 compliance for Crypto‑Asset Service Providers (CASPs) ended on March 2, 2026, forcing firms to secure payment‑institution authorisation or cease payment services. Providers already approved under PSD2 can continue, while those with pending applications...
SoFi and Mastercard Join Forces to Integrate SoFiUSD for Global Settlement
SoFi and Mastercard announced a partnership to embed the neobank’s USD‑backed stablecoin, SoFiUSD, into Mastercard’s global payments network. The integration will allow SoFiUSD to be used for settlement across the network and on Mastercard’s Multi‑Token Network, a digital‑asset platform. Launched...
Global Fintech Leaders: Key Players by Region in 202
The article maps the world’s fintech powerhouses, highlighting the United States’ infrastructure giants like Stripe and Plaid, Europe’s regulation‑driven champions such as Revolut and Adyen, Latin America’s Nubank dominance, Africa’s mobile‑money foundation with M‑Pesa, and Asia’s massive transaction ecosystems led...
TransferGo Enters New Stage of Growth as Bank of Lithuania Expands EMI Licence
The Bank of Lithuania has broadened TransferGo's electronic money institution licence, allowing the fintech to keep its core cross‑border money‑transfer and payment‑account services while adding new consumer products. The company plans to roll out TransferGo payment cards across the European...
BitGo Offers Crypto as a Service in Europe
BitGo Europe GmbH will launch Crypto as a Service (CaaS) across the European Economic Area after securing a MiCA licence from Germany’s BaFin. The company, founded in 2013, already serves over 2,000 institutional clients in 90 countries and went public...
Deloitte Signs Off on Anchorage Reserve Report for Tether’s USAT Stablecoin
Deloitte & Touche issued an independent attestation confirming that Anchorage’s USAT reserve report complies with the AICPA 2025 criteria for asset‑backed, fiat‑pegged tokens. The report, covering reserves as of Jan. 31, 2026, shows $17.6 million in assets backing 17.5 million USAT tokens, leaving a...
Buy This Payments Stock After Its Latest Round of Layoffs, Says HSBC
HSBC upgraded Block (SQ) to a Buy, lifting its price target to $77, implying about 19% upside. The upgrade follows Block’s announcement of cutting more than 4,000 jobs, reducing its headcount to roughly 6,000 employees. HSBC’s analyst Saul Martinez highlighted...
SymphonyAI Helps Spanish Bank Transform Sanctions Screening
A top‑ten Spanish bank overhauled its sanctions screening by deploying SymphonyAI’s SensaAI for Sanctions, slashing false positives by 91.8% across transaction and customer checks. The AI overlay processes unstructured text with generative models and refines match accuracy using predictive analytics,...
Lenders Rethink Outreach as Trigger Leads Face Limits
Mortgage originators are split on the value of trigger leads as the Homebuyers Privacy Protection Act takes effect on March 5, forcing a shift to permission‑based marketing. Proponents argue trigger leads provide quick consumer access, but critics cite reliability issues and...
Napier AI AML Index 2025: The Nations Leading the Charge
The Napier AI/AML Index 2025‑2026 estimates that AI‑driven anti‑money‑laundering (AML) solutions could shave $183 billion off global compliance costs, up from $138 billion last year, and generate $3.3 trillion in economic benefits. The United States tops potential AI savings at $26.18 billion, followed by...
Piero Cipollone: The Digital Euro - Enhancing Payments in the Euro Area
In a February 2026 speech to Italy’s Parliamentary Committee, ECB Executive Board member Piero Cipollone outlined the digital euro initiative, stressing its role in modernising payments and reinforcing trust through democratic legitimacy. He framed the project as a strategic response...
What Does Programmable Money Mean for Treasury Operations?
Programmable money embeds conditional logic into cash movements, turning treasury processes from batch‑based to event‑driven. It leverages a mix of digital instruments—CBDCs, stablecoins, and tokenised deposits—to meet varied operational needs. AI‑guided payment libraries add automation while preserving governance, and quantum‑resistant...
Governance Is the Real Differentiator in AI-Led Lending: Markandey Upadhyay, Piramal Finance
AI governance is emerging as the key differentiator for Indian NBFCs, according to Piramal Finance’s Chief Data & Analytics Officer Markandey Upadhyay. Piramal has built an AI‑native operating model that embeds unified data, agentic decision systems, and risk‑specific scorecards across...
Oxford Square Capital Corp (OXSQ) Q4 2025 Earnings Call Transcript
Oaktree Specialty Lending Corp reported adjusted net investment income of $36.1 million ($0.41 per share) for the quarter, a modest rise from the prior period. New funded investments surged 42% to $314 million, expanding the fair‑value portfolio to $2.95 billion with a weighted‑average...
Quavo Enhances Fraud Dispute Operations for Apple FCU
Quavo Fraud & Disputes has partnered with Apple Federal Credit Union to deploy its AI‑driven QFD platform, automating the entire fraud dispute lifecycle. The solution, trained on more than 20 million real‑world cases, promises faster claim resolutions, reduced manual workload, and...
ISDA/ASIFMA Request Clarifications on RBI IRD Master Directions
On February 11, 2026 ISDA and the Association of Securities and Intermediaries in Financial Markets (ASIFMA) sent a joint letter to the Reserve Bank of India requesting clarification on the RBI’s 2025 Master Direction for Rupee Interest Rate Derivatives. The...
NFC-Based IDV with Liveness Delivers Zero Fraud, Fewer Support Calls for BankID Norway
BankID Norway, serving 4.7 million users, processed nearly 901 million transactions in 2025. Since mid‑2024 it has layered NFC‑based biometric ID verification with iProov’s liveness check, completing one million activations that now represent about half of all new enrollments. The combined approach has...
Cake Wallet Launches Self-Custodial Lightning
Cake Wallet introduced self‑custodial Lightning support, allowing users to send and receive Bitcoin instantly on mobile without managing channels, liquidity, or staying online. The integration leverages the Breez SDK and Spark, keeping funds under user control while offering privacy‑by‑default features....
Santander and Mastercard Pilot Agentic Commerce
Santander and Mastercard completed Europe’s first fully agentic payment when an AI‑driven agent bought a T‑shirt in Spain, marking the inaugural regulated‑bank transaction of its kind. The pilot used Mastercard’s Agent Pay platform, demonstrating that AI agents can transact while...