India's Reserve Bank Cracks Down on 150 Nonbank Lenders
On May 14 the Reserve Bank of India cancelled the certificates of registration for 150 non‑banking financial companies, most of them located in West Bengal and New Delhi. The move, exercised under Section 45‑IA(6), follows a recent Financial Intelligence Unit list that flagged many of these firms for AML/CFT lapses. It represents the biggest batch of NBFC cancellations in the past five years, signaling a systematic cleanup of inactive or non‑compliant legacy lenders. Major fintech platforms remain untouched, but the RBI is tightening oversight of smaller players.
Brazil's Bradesco Launches Crypto Custody for 75M Customers
Bradesco, one of Latin America’s biggest banks, just announced it will start offering Bitcoin and crypto custody services. They serve more than 75 million customers. Traditional finance is rapidly adopting crypto. 🚀 https://t.co/wOuKXvSK5d
Revolut Clears Regulatory Hurdle, Launches Full‑service UK Bank
Revolut said the Prudential Regulation Authority has removed limits on its banking licence, allowing the fintech to roll out a full‑service UK bank to its 13 million British customers. The launch follows a pledge to invest up to $4 bn and create...
Poland’s BLIK Joins EuroPA and EPI to Launch Pan‑European Mobile Payment Interoperability
Poland‑based mobile payment service BLIK has become a member of the European Payments Alliance (EuroPA) and the European Payments Initiative (EPI), positioning the app for cross‑border interoperability. The move aims to let users send P2P transfers across the network in...
PayModum Acquires Floid Inc., Boosting Instant Bank Payment Suite
PayModum, the London‑based payment gateway, announced the acquisition of Delaware‑registered Floid Inc., a firm that provides direct relationships for instant online bank payments. The deal, announced on May 17, 2026, enhances PayModum’s real‑time payment offering and adds account‑information services, though...
Mastercard and JD.com Ink Deal to Enhance Global Commerce Ecosystem
Mastercard and JD.com have signed a strategic partnership to build a more connected, secure and intelligent commerce ecosystem. The collaboration will create a global payment infrastructure supporting JD.com’s international expansion and broaden card acceptance for travelers in China. It also...
BBVA Takes Its Banking Experience Into ChatGPT
BBVA has launched a conversational banking app inside OpenAI’s ChatGPT for customers in Italy and Germany, allowing users to ask natural‑language questions about accounts, cards and savings products without leaving the AI assistant. The app provides product information and direct...
First Bank of Nigeria Rolls Out Naira‑Branded Visa Debit Card to Boost Cashless Payments
First Bank of Nigeria has launched a Naira‑branded Visa debit card in partnership with Visa, targeting everyday consumers and supporting the nation’s cashless‑economy drive. The card will be available to all eligible First Bank account holders nationwide, offering POS, ATM...
Tempo Adds Morpho's $7.5 Bn DeFi Lending Marketplace to Stripe-Backed Payments Chain
Tempo, the payments‑first blockchain backed by Stripe and Paradigm, announced the integration of Morpho's $7.5 bn DeFi lending marketplace. The move gives enterprises on the chain access to on‑chain credit, borrowing and yield products, signaling a deeper convergence of traditional fintech...
SEC to Propose Tokenized Stock Framework as Wall Street Efforts Deepen: Bloomberg
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is preparing an “innovation exemption” that would allow platforms to trade tokenized versions of publicly listed stocks under a lighter regulatory regime. The proposal could be released as early as this week, signaling a...
How Digital Assets Are Changing Banking
In this episode, Morgan Stanley’s Global Head of Banks and Diversified Finance Research, Betsy Grasik, projects how digital assets will reshape global wholesale banking by 2030. She identifies three drivers—fintech market support, clarifying U.S. legislation (the Genius Act in 2025...
African Fintechs Target the Gulf for Global Growth
African fintechs are establishing bases in Dubai to tap the Gulf‑Africa remittance corridor, with players like MNT‑Halan, Paymob, Innovate1Pay and Flutterwave expanding regionally. Migrant workers in the GCC send roughly $36 billion annually—about a third of the $109 billion total remittances to...
Discovery Bank Shows How AI Could Change App Engagement
Discovery Bank has deployed Discovery AI, a generative AI system that continuously monitors client behavior and surfaces real‑time, personalized financial actions inside its app and WhatsApp. Built on Azure OpenAI, Foundry Models and Azure Databricks, the engine combines behavioral modeling...
Always-On Fraud Checks Cut Suncoast's Losses by a Third
Suncoast Credit Union deployed Alloy’s identity‑and‑fraud decisioning platform to move from one‑time checks at onboarding to continuous, always‑on monitoring across the member lifecycle. In 2024 the credit union examined 269 million digital logins, automatically approving 98% while flagging just 11,990 for...
Fiserv Q1 2026 EPS Beats Forecast as Stock Slides 10% Post‑Call
Fiserv reported first‑quarter 2026 earnings of $1.79 per share and $5.03 billion in revenue, surpassing analyst forecasts. Despite the beat, the stock tumbled more than 10% in pre‑market trading and remained volatile, reflecting concerns over organic revenue decline and future growth.
IDenfy Teams with Lithuania’s RATO Bank to Boost Mobile KYC Conversion by 9%
iDenfy has integrated its AI‑powered identity verification and AML screening tools into RATO Bank’s digital onboarding flow, lifting mobile conversion rates by 9% in the past month. The partnership lets new customers complete full KYC in under a minute on...
Fasset Secures $51 Million Series B to Scale Stablecoin Neobank Globally
Fasset announced a $51 million Series B round, the largest in the payments sector for 2026, backed by SBI Group, Arz Portföy, Investcorp and family offices. The capital will accelerate the rollout of its regulated, stablecoin‑based banking services across Asia, Africa...
First Trump, Now Mamdani; Politicians Stepping Into Payments
Western Union’s $500 million acquisition of Intermex faces opposition from New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who argues the deal will raise remittance fees for immigrant families. The mayor has asked the New York State Department of Financial Services to reject the merger, framing...
Digital‑native Firms Rival Banks with Far Fewer Staff
𝗧𝗼𝗺 𝗟𝗲𝗲 𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗰𝘁𝘀 𝟱 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝟭𝟬 𝗹𝗮𝗿𝗴𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗯𝗮𝗻𝗸𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝗴𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻 𝗮 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗮𝗱𝗲: "JPMorgan makes $60 billion a year, the most profitable bank in the world, with 300,000 employees. Jane Street... just reported $10 billion...
Credit Card Transactions Jump 2.6 Times in Four Years: RBI Report
India’s credit‑card transaction volume surged 2.6‑fold between 2021 and 2025, reaching 570 crore transactions and a value of ₹23.2 lakh crore (about $280 billion), up from ₹8.9 lakh crore in 2021. Private‑sector banks expanded their share to 71.1% of outstanding cards, while public‑sector banks held roughly...
Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News
National Australia Bank acquired the account‑to‑account payments platform Banked, while equipifi secured a $34 million round to expand embedded Buy‑Now‑Pay‑Later capabilities. Mitek Systems partnered with FICO to list its Verified Identity Platform on the FICO Marketplace, and State Employees’ Credit Union...
Trafigura Turns to Tether as Stablecoins Take on Commodities
Trafigura Group Pte Ltd is negotiating a pilot with Tether to accept the US‑dollar stablecoin at fuel stations operated by its Puma Energy arm in El Salvador. The initiative targets petrol‑pump payments, leveraging blockchain to reduce friction and transaction costs....
Stripe-Backed Tempo Taps $7.5 Billion DeFi Lender Morpho to Expand Beyond Payments
Tempo, the Stripe‑ and Paradigm‑backed blockchain focused on stablecoin payments, has partnered with DeFi lender Morpho to bring its $7.5 billion lending marketplace onto the network. The integration adds on‑chain borrowing, lending and yield‑earning products, allowing fintechs and enterprises to put...
TIMVERO Launches timveroAI, Slashing Lending Platform Build Time to Weeks
TIMVERO announced the general availability of timveroAI, an AI layer built directly into its timveroOS building platform. The technology compresses initial deployments from four‑to‑six months down to three‑to‑six weeks and automates 70‑80% of the engineering effort, promising faster credit‑product launches...
Xago and NGPES Integrate Cross-Border Payment Systems Across 20+ African Currencies
South Africa’s Xago and France’s NGPES have integrated their payment platforms to enable instant cross‑border transfers between euro‑denominated accounts and more than 20 African fiat currencies, as well as digital assets. The partnership routes euro payments through Xago’s network, converting...
Fasanara Capital’s Francesco Filia on the Opportunity in Fintech Lending
Fasanara Capital, led by Francesco Filia, now oversees more than $6 bn in assets and deploys capital through fintech platforms that lend to small‑ and medium‑size enterprises. The firm differentiates itself by systemising loan origination and focusing on the middle market, avoiding...
Credit Card Loyalty Is Moving From Plastic to Platforms
Credit card issuers are increasingly viewing their mobile apps as the primary battleground for loyalty, with app quality now shaping which card sits at the top of a consumer’s wallet. A PYMNTS Intelligence and Elan study finds that nearly 70%...
SEC Clears Nasdaq to Pilot Blockchain Tokenized Stock Offerings
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission gave Nasdaq permission to launch a pilot that will let qualified participants trade tokenized versions of Russell 1000 equities and major ETFs on its platform. The move, backed by a partnership with Kraken and...
Thailand’s NDID Wins APAC Digital Identity Award
Thailand’s National Digital ID Company (NDID) was named Digital Identity Verification of the Year in Asia 2026 by Enterprise Security Magazine APAC. The award highlights NDID’s open‑source, federated identity network that now supports more than 60 million digital identities and processes...
5 BNPL Myths the South African Market Has Proven Wrong
South African consumers are embracing Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) as a budgeting tool, with 41% having used it in the past year, according to TransUnion’s Q1 2026 Consumer Pulse Study. Payflex’s CMO Tracey‑Lee Zürcher‑Campbell argues that BNPL helps avoid high‑interest credit‑card...
Kraken Wants to Be a (Legally Speaking) Bank. Why?
Kraken's parent Payward has filed for a trust charter with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, a step that could upgrade the exchange to a full‑service bank and secure a master account at the Federal Reserve. The Independent...
CFI Launches Local Stock Trading on DFM
CFI Financial Group has launched more than 40 local stocks listed on the Dubai Financial Market, allowing its clients to trade UAE equities through its regulated platform. The integration, facilitated by BHM Capital’s Direct Market Access, connects investors to companies...
After Kraken’s “Skinny” Fed Account, What’s Next for Crypto?
In March, Kraken became the first cryptocurrency exchange to obtain a Federal Reserve “skinny” master account, granting it direct access to FedWire and FedNow payment rails. The limited account provides settlement capability without traditional banking privileges such as interest earnings...
Telr and Geidea Partner to Bridge the Online-Offline Retail Gap in the UAE
Telr, a UAE‑licensed payments acquirer, has teamed up with Saudi fintech Geidea to deliver a unified omnichannel commerce solution. The partnership merges Telr’s proprietary payment gateway—supporting more than 120 currencies and 30 languages—with Geidea’s intelligent point‑of‑sale hardware. Together they aim...
Club Conversation with Charlie Youakim, 85x Return in 3 Years
Charlie Youakim, co‑founder and CEO of Sezzle, discussed how the buy‑now‑pay‑later firm grew from a $35 million market‑cap to a valuation exceeding $3 billion in under three years—an 85‑fold increase. Sezzle raised roughly $120 million, a fraction of the capital deployed by rivals...
Stitch Closes $25M Series A Led by Andreessen Horowitz
Stitch, a Riyadh‑based cloud‑native operating system for banks, closed a $25 million Series A round led by Andreessen Horowitz, bringing its total funding to $35 million. The platform unifies lending, cards, payments and ledger functions, allowing institutions to replace legacy cores module‑by‑module. In...
1 in 5 Shoppers Left Their Wallet at Home Today. Is Your Store Ready for Them?
A McKinsey study shows one in five U.S. shoppers now leave home without a physical wallet, using phones for tap‑to‑pay across age groups. Millennials (66.7%) and Gen X (44%) have embraced digital wallets, making cash and card‑only checkout a competitive liability....
FIS and Anthropic Deploy Agentic AI for AML Investigations
FIS and Anthropic Launch Agentic AI for Bank AML Investigations - Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH https://t.co/MMfz0yzfyj https://t.co/J2MyKukFl2
More and More, These Invisible Hands Are Shaping Your Restaurant, Hotel, Event, and Other Purchases
Credit card issuers are embedding dining, travel and event services into their rewards platforms, turning reservation apps like Resy and Tock into proprietary ecosystems. American Express bought Resy in 2019 and paid $400 million for Tock; Chase acquired The Infatuation and...
Paytm Launches Pocket Money Feature for Teenagers without Bank Accounts
Paytm has introduced "Pocket Money," a UPI‑based payment feature that lets teenagers transact without a personal bank account. Built on NPCI’s UPI Circle framework, the service allows parents to allocate a monthly allowance and set per‑transaction caps of roughly $60,...
Can MobiKwik’s Lending Ambitions Ease The Payments Burden?
MobiKwik posted a Q4 FY26 net profit of ₹4.4 Cr (≈$0.5 M) after a ₹56 Cr loss a year earlier, and EBITDA turned positive at ₹17.4 Cr (≈$2.1 M). Payments revenue stayed flat at ₹211.6 Cr (≈$25 M) despite a 58% rise in GMV and a 170%...
Google Embeds Klarna, Affirm BNPL Into Gemini AI, Reshaping Checkout
Google has woven Klarna and Affirm financing into its Gemini AI platform, allowing U.S. users to view buy‑now‑pay‑later options inside Google Search, Google Pay and the Gemini app. The move pushes BNPL providers from traditional checkout pages into conversational AI,...
Digital Asset Clearing Center Raises $10 Million to Build Tokenized Market Infrastructure
Digital Asset Clearing Center (DACC) closed a $10 million financing round led by strategic investors Conflux, Transaction Technologies Limited and Global InfoTech. The capital will fund a clearing‑as‑a‑service platform that links tokenized assets with traditional payment rails, positioning DACC as potential...
U.S. Consumers Shift to Digital‑Only Banks, Undermining Retail Giants
U.S. customers are abandoning physical branches for neobanks, driving more than 50 million primary checking accounts to digital‑only platforms. The migration, highlighted by a Wells Fargo branch’s foot‑traffic drop from 80 to 16 daily customers, forces incumbents to confront a new competitive...
Earnings Reveal New Race to Control the Merchant Stack
Earnings from Block, PayPal, Shopify and Fiserv show merchant services evolving from pure payment processing to full‑stack commerce platforms. Companies are bundling payments, AI‑driven workflow tools, payroll, financing and loyalty programs to become embedded in daily merchant operations. Growth metrics...
EPC Unveils 2025 SEPA Instant Payments Rulebook, Lifting Caps and Adding Millisecond Timestamps
The European Payments Council released the 2025 SEPA Instant Credit Transfer rulebook, set to become effective on October 5, 2025. The overhaul removes the €100,000 transaction ceiling, introduces millisecond‑level timestamps and other technical tweaks, forcing all Eurozone payment service providers...
OpenAI Rolls Out Bank‑linked Finance Tools for ChatGPT Pro in U.S. Preview
OpenAI has begun a U.S. preview of personal‑finance tools for ChatGPT Pro, letting subscribers link bank accounts through Plaid. The feature reaches more than 12,000 financial institutions and is aimed at the 200 million users who ask money‑related questions each month,...
The Rise of Tokenisation
Thailand’s financial sector is gearing up for a disruptive shift as tokenisation and blockchain finance promise to convert stocks, bonds, gold, real‑estate and other assets into digital tokens within the next five years. Industry leaders argue that a unified blockchain...
Stripe President Says Shoppers Want to Leave Mundane Tasks to AI
Stripe co‑founder and president John Collison told Bloomberg that the next wave of e‑commerce will be driven by "agentic commerce," where AI agents handle routine checkout tasks for shoppers. He argues that consumers want low‑friction experiences, preferring AI to fill...
Closing the Gap: The Regulatory and Structural Maturation of Digital Assets
Digital assets have moved from a niche experiment to a $2.66 trillion market, driven by structural reforms that separate custody, execution, and clearing. The U.S. GENIUS Act, enacted in July 2025, imposes a 100 % reserve requirement on stablecoins, turning them into transparent,...