Know What's Happening in FinTech
Know What's Happening in FinTech
FinTech Pulse
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EMAIL DIGESTS
Daily
Every morning
Weekly
Tuesday recap
Banks and payment networks are deploying artificial intelligence to reshape credit‑card rewards, moving the battle from the checkout to an AI‑driven offers feed. By mining transaction histories and behavioral signals, issuers can generate merchant discounts and category bonuses that match each cardholder’s real‑time spending habits. This dynamic approach replaces static, broad‑category programs with personalized incentives that appear before a purchase, aiming to steer the consumer’s payment choice. The shift reflects a broader industry need to retain loyalty as shoppers juggle cards, digital wallets, and buy‑now‑pay‑later options.
AI could become one of the most powerful tools in the fight against financial crime, not by expanding surveillance, but by rebuilding integrity into digital systems. If AI can create stronger evidence chains that connect documents, actions and transactions, it can...
Amazon Web Services’ 2026 "Banking on the Cloud" report declares cloud computing a strategic foundation for modern banks. It outlines six trends—agentic AI, hyper‑personalised experiences, unified data platforms, ecosystem banking, resilient infrastructure, and modular architectures—that together reshape operations and product...
Kenya’s central bank and Rwanda’s national bank have signed a memorandum of understanding to develop a licence‑passporting framework for payment service providers. The arrangement would let fintech firms licensed in one country operate in the other without obtaining a new...
Connamara Technologies has hired Exactpro to perform independent, third‑party testing of its EP3® exchange and clearinghouse platform. EP3 currently powers thirteen exchanges and three clearinghouses, handling both traditional and emerging asset classes. Exactpro will execute functional, non‑functional, and performance tests...
Private credit is a ~$2 Trillion market and growing. Now 5 major private credit funds halted redemptions. The assets are illiquid but investors expect liquidity and price discovery. This is exactly what tokenization solves.
Rocket Pro’s chief revenue officer Austin Niemiec announced a partnership‑first strategy aimed at easing long‑standing tension between the two wholesale mortgage giants, United Wholesale Mortgage and Rocket. He highlighted the company’s new technology platform, which lets brokers retain full data ownership...
India’s neobank Fi is winding down the banking layer of its platform after four years of partnership with Federal Bank. The move forces its 3.5 million customers to access their savings accounts via Federal Bank’s FedMobile app instead of Fi’s interface....
Virtu Financial announced integration with Talos, enabling streaming of spot digital‑asset liquidity to institutional clients. The partnership extends Virtu’s over‑the‑counter (OTC) crypto pricing capabilities and adds its liquidity to Talos’s provider network. Virtu, a long‑standing principal market maker across equities,...
PayPal Holdings announced a strategic pivot for 2026, concentrating on strengthening its branded checkout services. Chief financial and operating officer Jamie Miller said the company will shift from broad portfolio scaling to a targeted approach that supports its largest merchants....
New Zealand’s Financial Markets Authority announced an expansion of its fintech sandbox, extending controlled market access beyond the initial six‑firm pilot. The regulator is also drafting an “on‑ramp” restricted licence that lets innovative firms enter the market under defined conditions,...
Lower Mortgage, formerly AmeriHome, offers a wide array of loan products across 100 locations in 47 states, but many options are not listed online. In 2024 the lender posted a higher‑than‑median mortgage rate of 6.625 % and a total loan‑cost of...
Mastercard announced two strategic moves to broaden its revenue beyond card fees: a live agentic commerce test in Malaysia using its Agent Pay platform, and the launch of a global Crypto Partner Program that enlists over 85 cryptocurrency firms. The AI‑driven...
In this episode, Andy Pickering talks with Joshua Sum, Chief Product Officer at Solayer, about the company's hardware‑accelerated blockchain built on Solana that aims to achieve ultra‑high throughput for real‑time financial transactions. Joshua explains Solayer's approach of separating consensus onto...
Aave Labs unveiled Aave V4, a security‑by‑design upgrade, alongside a newly redesigned app aimed at mainstream crypto adoption. The V4 security program allocated $1.5 million, delivered 345 days of expert review, and involved top auditors and a public contest that found...
Global Citizen Solutions released a briefing titled "Crypto Secure Jurisdictions: Where Crypto Actually Works" that evaluates how 22 countries are embedding digital assets into tax, licensing and banking systems. The report shifts investor focus from asset selection to the legal...
I Tried All Payment Gateways for Shopify (This Is The Best in 2026) WATCH HERE 👉 https://t.co/utoos322TU Finding the right Shopify payment gateway in 2026 is a nightmare, so I tested them all for you. In this video, I break down the...
Glia’s 2026 Banking AI Benchmarks Report finds that 95% of generic generative‑AI pilots never reach production, urging banks to switch to industry‑specific tools. The study of 400 financial institutions shows purpose‑built AI delivers a 92%+ understanding rate, up to 94.8%...
Kraken’s parent company Payward Inc. has launched Paywall Services, a B2B infrastructure platform that consolidates stablecoin payments, tokenized asset markets, trading, staking, lending and global fiat‑crypto funding into a single integration. Built on Kraken’s 15‑year operating history, the service combines...
At the Inclusive Finance Forum in Kigali, leaders argued that Africa’s financial future hinges on digital public infrastructure rather than traditional banking apps. They emphasized a shift from mere inclusion toward wealth creation, calling for citizen‑owned digital wallets and interoperable...
Ford has introduced the Ford Rewards Visa Signature Credit Card in partnership with Comenity, replacing its previous FNBO‑issued FordPass card. The new card carries no annual fee and offers a dual‑bonus sign‑up package: 15,000 points and a $100 cash reward...
Coinbase’s x402 protocol, built on the HTTP 402 status code, aims to let AI agents execute instant stablecoin payments. Recent CoinDesk data shows the platform processes roughly 131,000 transactions per day with about $28,000 in total volume, and even its...
PCI Pal announced a partnership with Zoom to embed its secure payment technology into Zoom’s Virtual Agent (ZVA). The integration allows customers to complete transactions within AI‑driven virtual interactions while keeping payment data out of the organization’s environment. Building on...
Bilt’s original rent‑rewards credit card, co‑branded with Wells Fargo, failed to generate sustainable revenue and was discontinued. The replacement, Bilt 2.0, partners with tiny fintech bank Column, NA, whose assets are under $1 billion and interest earnings are negligible. Early user reports describe...
Traditional banks often make personal loans feel slow and paperwork‑heavy, prompting fintech innovators to reimagine the process. Platforms like Upstart apply machine‑learning models that evaluate a broader set of data points, not just FICO scores, to assess borrower risk. This...
ZendWallet has launched Zend Business, a platform that merges international payments and internal operations for African companies. At its core is ZendFX, a stablecoin‑based engine that moves funds in USDT and USDC across more than 140 countries, supporting transactions from...
Payments Canada’s February update shows the real‑time rail (RTR) system moving into Q1 2026 with a strong emphasis on resilience, security and anti‑fraud testing. The organization has completed system integration testing in Q4 2025 and is now deepening user acceptance testing while...
Mega Matrix, a Singapore‑based content producer, is expanding its digital asset treasury to include a diversified basket of stablecoins and their governance tokens. The strategy aims to generate 5‑10% yield through lending, liquidity provision, and staking in DeFi protocols. Executive...
Airlines can now offer travelers a split‑payment option through a new partnership between UATP and Hands In. The integration embeds Hands In’s split‑payment code into UATP’s Ceptor platform, letting customers combine multiple cards, debit accounts, or payors at checkout while...
This isn't our first chapter with Mastercard, but it's a big one. Excited to see Polygon part of the Crypto Partner Program to help shape what's next for onchain payments at global scale. We've been building toward this for years. TradFi and...
Great piece by @davideoks about the real story around ATMs & bank tellers (TLDR mobile banking is what actually hurt the profession) Analogy is the impact of AI may not be from incumbent AI adoption but simply from AI native cos...
Engine introduced the Visa‑branded Engine X charge card aimed at small and midsized businesses, a segment that often lacks corporate payment solutions. The card delivers 10% cash back on travel booked through Engine and 1.5% on other spend, while offering spend...
Wells Fargo just filed for the “WFUSD” trademark, which is basically their own dollar-backed stablecoins The Banks and financial institutions hate you, but love your deposits, they can gamble with and your tax dollars that bail them out when they lose...
"Aave is aspiring to become the JPMorgan of the world while Morpho is aspires to become infrastructure for JPMorgan" @PaulFrambot https://t.co/iSjFuEDUZe
Embedded finance platform AAZZUR announced a partnership with electronic money institution Wallester, integrating Wallester’s Visa‑principal card issuing infrastructure into AAZZUR’s regulated partner ecosystem. The collaboration enables AAZZUR’s clients across Europe to launch compliant card programs through a single integration, complementing...
"We want to build financing infrastructure ... that allows anyone to underwrite anyone" @PaulFram https://t.co/Cc4ufu0Lcr
"[Institutions] think of DeFi as the opportunity for them to extend and own end-to-end the product they offer from distribution to infrastructure" @PaulFrambot https://t.co/iSjFuEDUZe
Global Payments warned that the Middle East conflict is creating a modest headwind as flights for 12 of its largest regional airline clients are grounded, potentially affecting Q1 and Q2 results. CEO Cameron Bready said the impact on earnings and...
"As more assets get tokenized, you can do more lending against it and therefore it becomes more useful to tokenize more assets" @syrupsid https://t.co/iSjFuEDUZe
"syrupUSDC and syrup USDT have been the fastest growing product that we have" @syrupsid https://t.co/iSjFuEDUZe
A JPMorgan Chase Institute study of 4.5 million homeowners shows that cash‑strained borrowers increasingly turn to buy‑now‑pay‑later (BNPL) as a liquidity valve, especially when mortgage payments tighten budgets. BNPL spending spikes 34‑38% in the year before a first‑time home purchase, while...
Up next on Unchained • Private credit vs regular DeFi lending • The role of stablecoins in global finance • Why the next phase of DeFi will focus on institutional-grade lending markets. Come join us! https://t.co/Cc4ufu0Lcr
Scarce assets give everyone a way to store value with little dilution. That's why we just added tokenized gold to our app. Each XAUT token represents one fine troy ounce of gold stored in Swiss vaults. Fractional ownership. 24/7 trading. No vault...
The thirst for mindshare in agentic commerce and payments is UNHINGED rn. Everyone knows it will go parabolic. Nobody knows when. Such a weird dynamic.
any idea why Stripe would try to convince devs to shoot themselves in the foot with app and move to in app billing? this only works for Epic, not everyone. fishy
People are asking: Is the BILT credit card rollout the worst credit card rollout we've ever seen?
When zero human companies already use crypto But your fintech still requires 3 business days to settle You're not competing with other fintechs anymore You're competing with code that never sleeps
Forbes coverage of the ongoing rent/mortgage payment issues & customer service meltdown at @HeyBilt: https://t.co/cHSguZwiNL
Stripe's advantage: developer trust Coinbase's advantage: regulatory clarity Ethereum's advantage: decentralization The race to become robot money infrastructure isn't about technology It's about which narrative AI companies buy into first
It's pretty clear that essentially all of finance will move on blockchain-based rails in the coming years. The only real question left is how much value gets captured by tokens vs. other entities. That will be the battleground for the...
