MAS Puts AI at the Centre of Scam Prevention
Singapore’s Monetary Authority (MAS) has teamed with the Government Technology Agency, the police and five major banks on a proof‑of‑value project that uses artificial intelligence to spot high‑risk accounts and transactions before scams materialise. The initiative relies on real, historical banking data rather than synthetic test sets, allowing a collaborative model to detect patterns that single‑bank systems may miss. Account numbers are hashed to preserve privacy while enabling cross‑institutional analysis. If successful, MAS plans to broaden the AI framework to additional datasets and financial‑crime use cases, cementing Singapore’s role as a regulator‑driven AI pioneer.
Fiserv Faces a Difficult Reset Amid Revenue Declines
Fiserv reported first‑quarter adjusted revenue of $4.68 billion, down 2.4% year‑over‑year and missing analyst expectations. Both its Merchant Solutions and Financial Solutions divisions saw revenue declines, 1% and 6% respectively, reflecting weaker merchant growth and rising attrition in core banking. The...
Anthropic Launches 10 New Claude Agents
Anthropic introduced ten ready‑to‑use Claude agent templates for financial institutions, covering research, client coverage, and back‑office operations such as KYC screening and ledger reconciliation. The agents are embedded as add‑ins for Microsoft 365 apps, allowing users to build models in...
AI Agents Expose a Costly Blind Spot in Fraud Prevention
Merchants are now seeing legitimate AI‑driven purchases flagged as fraud as AI shopping agents mimic bot behavior. Traditional fraud models, which rely on human‑centric signals, struggle to distinguish authorized agents from malicious bots. The resulting false declines generate lost revenue...
EPI Confronts the Cloud Dilemma for Payments Sovereignty
The European Payments Initiative (EPI) launched its Wero wallet, now serving 53 million users in Belgium, France and Germany, to rival Visa and Mastercard. Despite its sovereignty goals, Wero still depends on non‑European cloud services for the low‑latency, high‑availability infrastructure payments...
Stablecoins Move Closer to the Payments Mainstream
Stablecoins are moving from a niche crypto tool to a mainstream payments option as U.S. regulators—including the Federal Reserve, FDIC and OCC—clarify banks' ability to work with digital assets. Executives at Nacha’s Smarter Faster Payments conference said the debate has...
France’s CB and the New Battle for European Payments Sovereignty
France’s domestic card scheme Cartes Bancaires (CB) is reviving its role amid growing scrutiny of Europe’s reliance on US payment networks. Under CEO Philippe Laulanie, CB is promoting co‑badging, allowing cards to work on both the French network and Visa...
UK Government Moves to Future-Proof Payments Regulation
The UK government unveiled a sweeping payments reform package that unifies regulation for traditional payments, stablecoins, tokenised deposits and AI‑driven transactions. By creating a single framework, it seeks to eliminate overlapping crypto‑asset licences and give firms clearer market routes. The...
Banks to Reinforce Cyber Defences as AI Changes the Threat Model
Banks are accelerating cyber‑defence programs as artificial intelligence reshapes the economics of digital attacks. AI shortens the time needed to locate vulnerabilities, craft convincing fraud attempts, and launch large‑scale intrusion campaigns, making the financial sector a prime target. Recent data...
Regulators Confront AI-Driven Cyber Risk After Anthropic Warning
British regulators—including the Bank of England, FCA and NCSC—are urgently assessing Anthropic’s new AI model Claude Mythos Preview after it flagged thousands of serious software vulnerabilities. The model, released as a gated research project called Glasswing, has prompted parallel concern...
Bank of America’s CashPro App Usage Rises 20%
Bank of America reports that its CashPro mobile platform processed a record $1.2 trillion in payments during 2025, roughly $38,000 each second, while user sign‑ins climbed 20% year over year. The growth reflects a broader shift toward mobile‑first treasury operations, where...
Wero’s Dutch Test Will Show Whether European Payments Sovereignty Can Outweigh Local Success
Wero plans to absorb the Dutch iDEAL scheme, testing whether a pan‑European account‑to‑account network can replace a highly successful local payment system. The migration will introduce consumer dispute handling, purchase protection, and a shift from iDEAL’s flat per‑transaction fee to...
CHIPS Growth Underlines Enduring Importance of High-Value Dollar Payments Infrastructure
The Clearing House’s CHIPS network posted a 9% rise in average daily value to $2.014 trillion and a 12% increase in daily payment volume in 2025, underscoring its expanding role in high‑value dollar settlements. By continuously matching and offsetting transactions, CHIPS...
IMF Warning on Tokenisation
The IMF cautions that tokenisation, while promising faster, cheaper payments, could amplify systemic risk by removing traditional settlement delays that act as safety buffers. Near‑instant settlement and smart contracts may accelerate shock transmission, limiting regulators' ability to intervene. Stablecoins, as...
Meta Fraud Pressure Grows as Payments Association Calls for Shared Liability
The Payments Association released a white paper warning that authorized push payment (APP) fraud now largely originates on digital platforms such as Meta’s Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. It cites that roughly two‑thirds of APP fraud cases in early 2025 began...
Nexi and PayPal Widen European Alliance in Push to Simplify Digital Commerce
Nexi and PayPal have expanded their partnership beyond Italy, embedding PayPal’s ecosystem directly into Nexi’s merchant platform across Europe. The rollout will initially cover Italy, the Nordics and Poland, giving merchants a single point of connection for digital payments and...
China Pushes CIPS to Compete with Western Payment Networks
China is accelerating reforms to its Cross‑Border Interbank Payment System (CIPS) to position it as a viable alternative to Western‑dominated payment networks. The first major rule change since 2018 expands CIPS beyond renminbi‑only clearing, adding multicurrency settlement and broader foreign‑payment...
Thunes Links Stablecoin Payouts to the Swift Banking Network
Thunes announced that its stablecoin payout service will operate over the SWIFT interbank messaging network. The solution enables banks linked to SWIFT to send near‑instant payments to more than 500 million stablecoin wallets in over 140 countries, currently supporting USDC and...
Riksbank Turns up Pressure on Banks over Instant Payments
Sweden’s central bank, the Riksbank, has warned banks to roll out broader instant domestic payment services within a year or face possible legislation. The regulator set a March 2027 deadline for banks to launch or present credible plans for real‑time...
US E-Commerce Extends Its Lead in Consumer Spending
U.S. e‑commerce sales closed 2025’s fourth quarter at $316.1 billion, a 1.7% quarter‑over‑quarter rise that lifted the online share of total retail to 16.6%. By contrast, overall retail grew only 0.4% in the same period. Full‑year e‑commerce reached $1.23 trillion, up 5.4%...
Why Delivery Matters More than Vision in Payments Reform
The UK has published its Strategy for Future Retail Payments Infrastructure, moving the conversation from high‑level vision to concrete delivery. Early design decisions—such as system architecture, sequencing, and operational responsibilities—will dictate cost, resilience, and user experience. Brazil’s PIX instant‑payment platform...
When AI Shops on Your Behalf, Who Owns the Transaction?
AI‑driven “agentic commerce” is allowing autonomous systems to purchase goods and services on behalf of consumers. This shift challenges the long‑standing reliance on a consumer’s click as proof of intent, prompting Visa and Mastercard to test pilot programs for machine‑initiated...
Nexi Unveils ‘Nexi Ready’ as Europe Embrace ‘Buy’ Model
Nexi Group has launched Nexi Ready, a fully managed digital‑issuing platform that lets banks, corporates and fintechs outsource technology, scheme compliance and day‑to‑day operations while keeping their brand and customer data. The service is positioned as a new “plug‑and‑play” issuing...
Britain’s Renewed Appetite for Credit Cards
The UK credit‑card market has rebounded, with net lending up 12.4% year‑on‑year in December 2025 and outstanding balances reaching a record £78 billion. Despite higher unemployment and elevated household debt, arrears sit at just 1.2%, and debt‑service ratios are roughly half...