CIMB's Customer Service Blames Busy Lines, Not Help
CIMB sidai saya a few times today. Called them to ask them about my World Mastercard. They said “can’t transfer to fraud dept because line busy.” Also said “we tried calling you but couldn’t get maybe You blocked the number?” 🤔 Among the worst services.
France Launches Loans for Small Firms Burdened by Fuel Costs
France to offer loans to small businesses hit by fuel costs https://t.co/LI4amD7JUi via @Alanrkatz https://t.co/YoG7EnyWGz
Open Finance Boosts Competition and Inclusion, Yet Challenges Persist
Opening doors to open finance: International experiences with #OpenFinance, its impact on competition, market entry and financial access, incl. the challenges that remain. 🆕Paper by @Hakan_Eroglu_tw, et al., @BIS_org: https://t.co/L6SV8MkeGL #financialinclusion https://t.co/jplwbELwpm
Community Banks Challenge OCC's Coinbase Trust Charter Approval
JUST IN: US community banks are fighting the OCC's approval of Coinbase's trust charter, claiming it doesn't meet regulatory requirements and risks consumers and the financial system.
Coinbase and Ripple Secure Conditional OCC Trust Bank Approval
Both Coinbase and Ripple have conditional approval from the OCC for a national trust bank. https://t.co/G5nAw4oeqg
Banks Poised to Battle SoFi's New Stablecoin
Noteworthy in that this is coming from SoFi CEO - which offers crypto and has announced its own stablecoin, SoFiUSD. Banks (insured depositories), understandably, are gonna fight tooth & nail on this-
FDIC Board Meeting Likely Unproductive on GENIUS
FDIC board meeting on Mon. Agenda includes NPRM on GENIUS implementation. Given the board is literally only FDIC Chair Hill, Comptroller Gould, & CPFB acting Director Vought, probably not worth the time to tune in. https://t.co/XvDu8U3oh3
CashApp Launches BNPL for Peer‑to‑peer Payments
The @CashApp just shipped BNPL for person-to-person payments Few thoughts 1: A lot of people want to pay back friends, feel guilty, and this unlocks that with better cashflow 2: CashApp FINALLY shipping AfterPay integrations that work 3: There's a BNPL for your drug...
SoFi's Fintech Façade Hides Risky Unsecured Loan Engine
$SOFI's "fintech" mask hides a massive unsecured lending operation - Bank in disguise: lending ~90% of profits, NII >60% - Growth driven by risky unsecured loans in a saturated market - Aggressive accounting inflates earnings - Re-rate to bank multiples => 60%+ downside https://t.co/ZZ8DRGoMRM
Mortgage Defaults Return to Pre‑pandemic Levels, Boosting Inventory
Mortgage defaults in the U.S. are now back to pre-pandemic levels. In Q4 2025, 4.3% of mortgage holders were in default, a level slightly higher than 2019 figures. This return to normalcy in mortgage defaults is actually good news, as it means...
Revolut's Tiny Fine Masks Looming AML Supervision Costs
Revolut's 2025 profit: $2.3 billion. The Lithuanian AML fine: €3.5 million. Trivial relative to profit. But it may have just put Revolut at the top of AMLA's direct supervision list starting 2028. AMLA supervision isn't a fine. It's a permanent structural overhead. That changes...
Revolut's PRAGMA AI: Data Moat Boosts Fraud Detection
Revolut Builds Its Own Foundation Model - PRAGMA Trained on 40 Billion Behavioral Events Revolut is building the AI infrastructure incumbents will struggle to replicate. PRAGMA: trained on 40B behavioral events from 25M users. 20% better fraud detection. Money laundering investigations from...
Google Pay Speeds up Android P2P Payments
Making money moves smooth since 2013. Also we didn’t forget Android. Google Pay is making your P2P payments faster too ⚡️
Fintechs Chartering Banks Face Traditional Price‑book Valuations
Gonna be interesting to see what happens to all these fintechs that are chartering banks, which are commonly valued on a price/book basis (rather than imaginary startup metrics, like rev multiples or MAUs)
Stablecoins Enable Scalable Agentic Payments and Smart Contracts
If you want to deploy agentic payments and smart contracts at scale, stablecoins are the natural fit. The infrastructure already exists. That’s where innovation is happening. https://t.co/YK1SyELUqQ
Public Chain + ZK Proofs Enable Regulator Transparency, User Privacy
Every bank building tokenized deposits chose a private or permissioned chain. @monument_bank chose a public chain - 𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐚𝐧𝐨’𝐬 𝐌𝐢𝐝𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 - and solved privacy with zero-knowledge proofs. Regulators see everything. The public sees nothing. This is what convergence looks like in practice. https://t.co/JGUF1elkZI
Crypto Firms, Banks to Review Revised Stablecoin Yield Bill
CLARITY ACT: 🚨 Senators Tillis and Alsobrooks’ revised stablecoin yield proposal is being reviewed by crypto firms and banks (starting April 2–3) to resolve their dispute and advance stalled legislation https://t.co/lh5xkx0lLG
ANT Scales 300% Revenue, Expands Across Asia
ANT`s performance Hong Kong HQ (since April 2025) → 300+ partners + 10K+ biz customers → 300% revenue growth. Regional momentum: Malaysia (Kenanga Investment Bank wealth Super App, TNG Digital 16M verified users), Indonesia, Philippines, driving growth. ZOLOZ eKYC deployed...
Payments Innovation Accelerates: Two Decades of Digital Insight
Innovation in payments is accelerating at an unprecedented pace. In this re-release of our episode with Rich Clow from @BankofAmerica, he shares insights from more than two decades at the forefront of digital payments transformation. Watch the full episode: https://t.co/nTriooD0iX
Banks Adopt Fractional Investing, Threatening WealthTech Edge
🇸🇬Are banks crashing WealthTech's investing party? Fractional investing helped #WealthTech players like Endowus, Syfe, and StashAway stand out and scale fast in a crowded market. Now banks such as OCBC and DBS are launching similar features, turning a former differentiator into...
Retail CBDC Banned Until 2030, Private Digital Money Grows
In 2021 I said legal tender laws were mostly theatre, a CBDC mandate was unlikely, and private digital money would lead. Five years on, the Fed sits on the sidelines, the Senate bans a retail CBDC through 2030, and digital...
Revolut Fined €13M in Italy, Compliance Gaps Persist
Reuters just reported `Italy fines Revolut over $13 million for alleged unfair commercial practices.` Some will say, the fine is small and is part of doing business. That isn't okay for the leading innovator and especially after a year-on-year increase in...
Agentic Spend: Cards, Stablecoins, or Both?
Agentic spend. Is it going to cards? Stablecoins? Both? LOVED this chat with @lithic 's Reggie Young 👇 https://t.co/mM0xZ7sARL
Mortgage Spreads Hold Steady Amid Global Turmoil
Considering all the drama in the world, not bad, hug a #mortgage spread. #realestate #housing #mortgagerates #chartdaddy
Circle Acts After Courts; Hackers Moved $300M Unchecked
Circle does blacklist addresses, but only after legal processes ⚖️ Meanwhile, hackers ran $300M through CCTP unchecked. ~ @omeragoldberg https://t.co/DpFazTNV4V
Private Credit Strain Could Spike Borrowing Costs, Stall Tech Boom
The Economist: "As private-credit funds’ woes intensify, they will raise the cost of borrowing for firms across the economy, at a time when the Iran war is weighing on companies’ margins. The cost of debt in public markets has already...
Stripe Drops TomoCredit; Adyen and Chargebee Remain
Per @JeffKauflin of Forbes, @stripe has ceased processing payments for TomoCredit -- but @Adyen still is A review of Tomo's site reveals it also works with subscription billing management platform @chargebee https://t.co/0zGTS6SQGG
Sessions Collapse Micropayments Into Two On‑Chain Transactions
Sessions are a killer feature of the @mpp Machine Payments Protocol It helps agents transact as quickly as possible by streaming tokens for real-time billing/pricing. Works with cards, stablecoins, and other payment methods
Central Bank Labs Demo Stablecoins, Shaping Tokenized Money
Before this podcast with the @bankofengland I didn't realize entral bankers build demo's to show how stablecoins work There's a lot going on at the central bank level for the future of tokenized money
Monument Bank Launches BaaS Platform for Building Societies
Monument Bank isn't just tokenizing deposits for its own clients. It's packaging the entire blueprint - legal, regulatory, technical - as a BaaS platform for building societies. First client: Ecology Building Society. From interest income to recurring SaaS fees. Details https://t.co/JGUF1elkZI
Dallas Fed Chief Defends Ample‑reserves, Rejects Tiered Quotas
In a speech this morning, Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan delivers a clear defense of the ample-reserves framework at a moment when others (Warsh/Bessent) have implied a course correction would be desirable. In the speech and a far more detailed...
Citi’s Fraud Detection Stops Skimmed Card Purchases Instantly
Impressed with Citi’s credit card fraud detection. Got an alert for $180 of beauty products that someone was trying to put through multiple times, and then $315 of Lululemon. We realized the card must have been skimmed at the...
Cross‑border Interoperability Makes WERO, Euro CBDC Essential
The WERO cross border interoperability is what matters most. Wero, Euro stablecoins, the Euro CBDC, and the EU ID; are foundational and will have network effects.
USDC Refuses Freezing Assets without US Government Request
"The problem is that USDC is just not it — they just don't ... I haven't heard a good explanation for why they're so hesitant to freeze things." -- @kaiynne @tayvano_ : They won't do it unless the US government...
Red‑team Your AI: Guard Against Fraudsters and Edge Cases
Your AI harness needs to handle adversarial inputs Financial services aren't just about helpful customers asking good-faith questions It's fraudsters, edge cases, and people trying to break your system for profit. If your testing doesn't include red-teaming, you're not ready
Stablecoin AI Payment Hype Crashes as Volumes Plummet
Stablecoin Firms Bet Big on AI Agent Payments That Barely Exist Stripe co-founder Collison projects "torrent of agentic commerce" on crypto rails: 24/7 settlement at <$0.01 per transaction = structural advantage vs card networks on micro-payments. Reality check: x402 volumes dropped...
Lucid Trading Signals New Regulatory Role in Prop Trading
Interesting development with AJ from Lucid Trading hinting at a regulatory role 👀 The prop trading landscape keeps evolving - always important to stay informed about who's overseeing what. Check https://t.co/pKoy2KH6Y5 for the full picture on all firms and their...
RBI Bans Banks From NDFs, Rebooking, Related‑party Forwards
Rbi saw that banks moved their positions to corporates or perhaps related parties and have said: Banks can't offer ndf rupee contracts to anyone If you close a contract from now, no rebooking, even if it's a deliverables contract. Banks can't deal...
Startups Swarm Mercury for Business and Personal Banking
LOVE @mercury for business banking services (not an investor but wish I was). 90%+ of startups I work with use them (including myself) and they now have personal banking services... so good.
Middle East War Lifts Fixed
Most Fixed Mortgage Rates Are Now In The 4% Range: What Should People Do? The War In The Middle East drove up Canada Bond Yields & therefore drove up Fixed Rates 5 - Yr 4.04% - 4.29% Variable Rate Mortgages now look...
Mortgage Refinance Demand Drops over 40% in a Month
Weekly #mortgage refinance demand is down more than 40% in the past month https://t.co/KBjl0aRgH6 @MBAMortgage @mortgagenewsmnd #interestrates #economy
Mortgage Applications Plunge 10% Weekly, Purchase Demand Slides 3%
Mortgage applications decreased 10.4 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey ... The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 3 percent from one week earlier.
Sub‑6% Mortgage Rates Hit Lowest Since 2015
Q4 2025 NMDB data reveals that 78% of mortgaged homes have a rate below 6%, that's down from the peak of 93% in Q2 2022. The share of mortgaged homes with a rate below 6% is the lowest since 2015....
Revolut’s $6B Revenue Masks Four Hidden Fault Lines
Revolut: $6B revenue. 38% margins. The North Star of banking. I found four fault lines that the earnings release doesn't mention. Full analysis on Substack / Subscribe 👇 https://t.co/kJ1iPnoooe https://t.co/B0plPkOngz
SEA QR Payments Surge, Powering Cross‑Border Trade
The IMF has a MUST-READ report covering Southeast Asia’s (SEA’s) QR-based digital payment revolution that is transforming cross-border payments, promoting local currency usage, and boosting trade and inclusion. Humble QR payments, born in China back in 2014, are now changing all...
Integrate AI Into Banking Operations for Competitive Edge
AI is no longer a “test and learn” exercise. Those who integrate it into live operations will set the pace for competitive advantage in banking. https://t.co/9jfjXgRP2i
Asset‑Liability Mismatches Trigger Liquidity, Then Credit Crunches
"Asset liability mismatches cause liquidity crunches and liquidity crunches can cause credit crunches. That’s just the way it is." - Kieran Goodwin (EP.494) With thanks to @AlphaSenseInc, @MorningstarInc, and Ridgeline.
CBDC Leaders Still Back Cash, Not Eliminating It
Is this what passes as scholarship at the @OMFIF these days? "Don’t kill cash - OMFIF" No CBDC-building nation has proposed the elimination of cash. Look at China and India as examples of the two largest. Both...
Banks Fail to Shield Your Money From Digital Scams
Your money is not safe. You are left completely exposed to digital financial crimes and e-banking scams. The latest BNM 2025 report proves that financial institutions are failing to properly protect you. Wake up before your hard-earned life savings vanish forever.
Asian Banks' Personal Touch Losing to Tech Scale
🌏Are Asian banks’ human-led model losing the #wealth war to tech rivals? Traditional #banks can no longer rely on personal ties alone as tech rivals use massive digital scale to rewrite the rules of #WealthManagement. Ed Lin, @BainandCompany via @AIWealth_net: https://t.co/Oxb9J9WGa4 #WealthTech...