The Fintech Landscape of Malawi in 2026
In 2026 Malawi’s fintech sector is moving from modest beginnings toward broader financial inclusion. Mobile‑money services have become the primary gateway to banking, supported by the Reserve Bank of Malawi’s modernization of the national payments switch and new interoperability rules. The government’s National Strategy for Financial Inclusion III (2024‑2028) aims to lift formal service access to 95% of adults by leveraging fintech, especially in rural areas. Around 20 fintech firms—mostly telecom‑backed—focus on payments, while mobile penetration sits at 70% and internet use at roughly 30%.
ClearBank Europe Secures First Dutch MiCAR Notification to Offer Digital Assets
ClearBank Europe became the first Dutch credit institution to secure a notification under the EU Markets in Crypto‑Assets Regulation (MiCAR), gaining approval from the Dutch Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM) to operate as a Crypto Asset Service Provider (CASP)....
Why Checkout Is Becoming the Most Valuable Moment in Commerce
The article argues that checkout has shifted from a simple transaction to the most valuable moment in commerce. Consumers now demand instant, one‑click payments and the ability to use preferred methods, while merchants can capture additional revenue by embedding financing,...
The Fintech Ecosystem of Libya in 2026
Libya’s fintech landscape in 2026 is emerging as a reconstruction tool amid ongoing post‑war recovery. While oil still supplies over 90% of export revenue and GDP per capita sits near $7,500, chronic cash shortages and fragmented banking have spurred digital...
In Profile: Robin Anderson, Head of Product Management at Tribe Payments
Robin Anderson, head of product management at Tribe Payments, outlines how the company is stripping legacy friction from payments by offering a flexible, end‑to‑end platform for issuers, acquirers and fintechs. In the past 18 months Tribe has opened offices in...
Started PR Named Official Partner for Banking Transformation Summit Europe 2026
Started PR has been appointed the official public‑relations partner for the Banking Transformation Summit Europe 2026, scheduled for May 19‑20 at London’s Tobacco Dock. The two‑day summit will convene over 170 banks and building societies and more than 150 senior...
Fintech Landscape in the Caribbean: Antigua and Barbuda in 2026
In 2026 Antigua and Barbuda is leveraging fintech to diversify an economy worth roughly $2 billion, where tourism accounts for more than 60% of GDP. Internet penetration tops 90%, providing a solid base for digital services and e‑government initiatives. The Eastern...
Fintech Awards London 2026 Shortlist Revealed as Industry Resilience Drives Record Growth
The Fintech Awards London 2026 shortlist was unveiled, showcasing 18 categories and a shift from experimental pilots to profitable, production‑scale fintech solutions across the UK capital. Notable finalists include Zopa Bank with 200,000 new current‑account users, iwoca’s £4.5 bn SME funding,...
EToro Relaunches AI Companion Tori with Real-Time X Intelligence
eToro has relaunched its AI investing companion, Tori, adding persistent memory, real‑time market sentiment from X powered by Grok 4.2, and the ability to create AI‑driven “Agent Portfolios.” The new memory feature lets Tori recall a user’s portfolio, interests, and prior...
PayDo Launches C2B Settlement Accounts to Accelerate Pay-by-Bank Transactions
PayDo, a UK‑licensed electronic money institution, has launched customer‑to‑business (C2B) settlement accounts that let merchants accept pay‑by‑bank payments via open banking. Funds transferred from a shopper’s banking app are settled to the merchant’s business account in under two seconds, with...
Kimberly Waldron on Global FinTech Scaling and AI Application
Kimberly Waldron, managing director of Startup PR, highlighted a shift in global fintech from early‑stage hype to mature, internationally‑focused growth. She noted that firms often carry pre‑seed support structures into later funding rounds, creating scaling friction. AI and stablecoins dominate...
Parkin and Secure Parking Partner to Launch 60,000 Barrierless Spaces Across the UAE
Dubai’s Parkin Company PJSC has partnered with global operator Secure Parking to roll out barrierless parking across the United Arab Emirates. Building on a successful pilot at City Walk, the alliance aims to convert more than 60,000 spaces to sensor‑based...
Asia’s Banking Leaders to Convene in Kuala Lumpur for The Asian Banker Summit 2026
TAB Global will host the 27th Asian Banker Summit on 13‑14 May 2026 at the Mandarin Oriental in Kuala Lumpur. More than 800 senior leaders from banks, central banks, regulators and tech firms across 20 countries will gather under the...
Fintech Landscape and Wider Digital Overview of Chile in 2026
Chile’s fintech ecosystem in 2026 is maturing within a stable, $350 billion economy that boasts the highest GDP per capita in Latin America. With roughly 400 fintech firms operating across payments, lending, wealthtech and insurtech, the sector is shifting from basic...
The Fintech and Wider Digital Overview of Japan in 2026
Japan’s fintech sector in 2026 is evolving through disciplined, incremental reforms rather than radical disruption. Cashless payments now account for about 45% of all transactions, reflecting steady consumer adoption backed by government incentives. Over 100 banks have deployed open API...
PayPoint and Handepay Hit £100m Business Lending Milestone Following Record Year
PayPoint and Handepay have crossed the £100 million ($127 million) mark in total business financing delivered to UK merchants, following a record‑breaking year. In the 2025/26 financial year they funded £33 million ($42 million), a 39% increase over the prior year’s £23 million ($29 million). The...
AI Drives ‘Always-On’ Compliance in the UAE as Azakaw Named IDC Innovator
Azakaw, a compliance operating system built for the MENA region, has been named an IDC Innovator in the IDC Innovators: Middle East Regulatory Technology Providers, 2026 report. The platform consolidates KYC, KYB, AML screening, transaction monitoring and corporate compliance into...
The Fintech Landscape of the Kingdom of Jordan in 2026
Jordan’s fintech sector has matured into a regional digital finance hub, driven by the REACH 2025 strategy and proactive central‑bank policies. The Central Bank of Jordan rolled out JoMoPay, the CliQ instant‑payment network, and an open‑banking sandbox, fostering interoperability and innovation....
Comarch and Sway Outcomes Partner to Bridge the Loyalty Strategy and Tech Execution Gap
European tech firm Comarch has teamed with loyalty consultancy Sway Outcomes to close the gap between loyalty strategy and technology execution. The partnership blends Comarch’s enterprise‑grade loyalty platform with Sway’s Customer Engagement Accelerator, a diagnostic tool that scores a brand’s...
Personal Conviction Outpaces Institutional Policy as Crypto Matures
The 2026 Crypto Intelligence Report, based on over 5,000 finance professionals across eight markets, finds a widening gap between personal crypto investments and institutional policy. While 25% view crypto as high‑risk, that perception falls to 10% among those who hold...
Dubai Becomes World’s First Jurisdiction to Codify Virtual Asset Issuance With New VARA Guidance
Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA) has released detailed Guidance on its Virtual Assets Issuance Rulebook, making the emirate the first jurisdiction worldwide to codify how digital assets are created, disclosed, and distributed under a licensed framework. The Guidance outlines...
Confirmo Secures Dual-Licensing in Ireland Ahead of Strict MiCA Deadline
Confirmo, a stablecoin‑first payment platform, has secured a Payment Institution licence from the Central Bank of Ireland, adding to its existing MiCA authorisation as a Crypto‑Asset Service Provider. The dual authorisation enables Confirmo Limited to process regulated stablecoin payments across...
Autotech Ventures Expands Into UAE to Drive GCC Auto Commerce Digitization
Autotech Ventures, the global VC dedicated to ground‑transport innovation, has opened a regional office in the United Arab Emirates to capture the Gulf Cooperation Council’s emerging auto‑commerce opportunities. The firm will back early‑stage founders building mobility fintech, AI‑driven dealership platforms,...
The Illusion of AI Sovereignty: US Dominance Highlights Global ‘Control Gap’
Tracxn’s new report maps AI infrastructure into three layers—data‑center location, cloud software ownership, and chip hardware—and shows the United States dominates the deepest layer. U.S. chip firms number 101 and have attracted $10.9 billion in equity, more than triple China’s $3 billion...
Fintech Ecosystem in the African Nation of Lesotho in 2026
Lesotho’s fintech sector is evolving slowly but purposefully, driven by high mobile penetration and government‑backed digital initiatives. Mobile money services such as M‑Pesa Lesotho dominate transactions, while the Central Bank of Lesotho rolls out a National Payments Strategy to modernize...
NCino AI Agent Slashes Bank Credit Review Times by 70%
nCino’s Analyst Digital Partner, launched in November 2025, is a role‑based AI agent that cuts commercial credit‑review times by 60‑70 %, turning multi‑day processes into a few hours. The tool can be integrated in as little as 36 minutes, as demonstrated by...
Lloyds Banking Group Leads Landmark Quantum Computing Experiment to Catch Money Mules
Lloyds Banking Group has completed a nine‑month pilot that used IBM’s 156‑qubit Quantum Heron computer to spot a concealed money mule within a synthetic transaction graph. By running quantum algorithms on anonymized real‑world data, the experiment successfully isolated the mule, demonstrating...
The Fintech and Wider Digital Ecosystem of India in 2026
India’s fintech ecosystem, built on public digital infrastructure like Aadhaar, UPI and Account Aggregators, has scaled to serve over a billion people. UPI now handles more than 14 billion transactions a month, with annual volumes exceeding $2.5 trillion, while the PMJDY program...
We’re Just Getting Started
Fintech’s first quarter showed a decisive pivot from speculative growth to AI‑driven utility and institutional‑grade infrastructure. Capital is concentrating on larger, data‑rich players that are investing heavily in artificial intelligence, embedded finance and compliance‑focused partnerships. European challengers like Monzo and...
The Fintech Landscape of Brazil in 2026
Brazil’s fintech ecosystem has matured into one of the world’s most sophisticated emerging‑market financial systems, driven by public‑policy initiatives and a surge of private‑sector innovation. The Central Bank’s Pix platform now handles over 6 billion transactions a month, moving roughly $550 billion...
Fintech Landscape in the Caribbean: The Bahamas in 2026
In 2026 the Bahamas, a $15 billion economy of just over 400,000 people, has cemented its reputation as a Caribbean fintech pioneer. The Central Bank’s Sand Dollar, the world’s first retail CBDC, has expanded into government payments, retail transactions and financial‑inclusion...
Neo4j CTO Highlights Graph Technology as Foundation for Reliable AI
Neo4j CTO Philip Rathle told Fintech Times that graph technology is becoming the backbone for reliable generative AI in finance. He highlighted how knowledge graphs complement large language models by providing deterministic, auditable facts, reducing hallucinations in regulated banking environments....
Flutterwave Secures Nigerian Banking License to Capture Multi-Trillion Naira Market
Flutterwave has secured a full Nigerian banking licence, allowing it to hold deposits and settle payments without a sponsoring bank. The move gives the fintech direct access to Nigeria’s clearing system, a market where digital transactions move trillions of naira...
NetSuite Rolls Out AI Updates to Help Finance Teams Automate with Control
At its SuiteConnect London event, Oracle NetSuite unveiled major upgrades to its AI Connector Service, aimed at giving finance teams tighter control while automating tasks. The new AI Connector Service Companion includes a curated library of more than 100 finance‑specific...
Bolivia’s Fintech Landscape in 2026
In 2026 Bolivia’s fintech sector is moving from obscurity to early growth as inflation, foreign‑currency shortages and liquidity constraints push consumers toward digital solutions. The government is negotiating roughly $9 billion in multilateral loans that tie infrastructure upgrades to financial‑inclusion projects,...
Eliminate the Black Box: How Gradient Labs Is Architecting Safe Agentic AI for Banking
Gradient Labs is building transparent, auditable AI agents for banks, addressing the industry’s fear of opaque large‑language models. By logging decision traces and binding LLMs to narrow tasks, the firm creates an audit trail that satisfies regulators. It also benchmarks...
UR and Ant Group’s TopNod Partner to Bring Onchain Assets to Everyday Spending
UR, a composable infrastructure provider, has teamed with TopNod, Ant Group’s non‑custodial wallet, to issue a co‑branded Mastercard. The card, supervised by Switzerland’s FINMA and issued by SR Saphirstein AG, lets users convert and spend over 20 digital assets directly...
NatWest and Sainsbury’s Expand Partnership to Launch Embedded Financial Products
NatWest and Sainsbury’s have signed an expanded agreement to embed a suite of financial products—savings, loans and a Nectar‑linked credit card—into the grocery retailer’s digital channels, with rollout slated for the second half of 2026. The deal builds on NatWest’s...
Legacy Payments Failing UK Businesses: GoCardless Points to Commercial VRPs as the Fix
GoCardless’ new research shows that outdated card‑based payment rails are eroding UK merchants’ profitability, costing an average of 3.5 % of monthly revenue. Among 489 recurring‑revenue leaders, 73 % report chronic friction, and 42 % spend over three hours each week managing fraud...
The Caucasus: Georgia’s Fintech Landscape in 2026
By 2026 Georgia has turned its geographic advantage into a deliberate digital‑finance strategy, coupling broadband expansion and e‑government reforms with a proactive central‑bank regulator. Leading banks such as TBC and Bank of Georgia operate like tech firms, offering integrated mobile...
Why AI Agents Are the New Era of UK Retail Banking
UK retail banking has become overwhelmingly digital, with 88% of adults—about 48 million people—using online channels for everyday transactions. While neobanks like Monzo and Revolut have set new service standards, traditional banks still lose customers; 265,000 switched banks in Q3 2025, and...
Revolut Secures Key Regulatory Approval in Peru, Moving to Formally Incorporate as a Bank
Revolut, the fintech with over 70 million users, has secured an Organisation Authorisation from Peru’s Superintendency of Banking, Insurance and AFP. The licence permits the company to formally incorporate as a bank and move toward a mandatory supervisory inspection for a...
Abound and NEAR AI Partner to Launch ‘Financial Autopilot’ for Non-Resident Indians
Abound, the Times of India‑backed super‑app for Indians abroad, announced a partnership with NEAR AI to launch an AI‑powered “Financial Autopilot.” The service will move beyond recommendations, automatically executing remittances, managing NRE/NRO accounts, paying bills and providing a real‑time net‑worth...
Behind the Idea: Lucanet
Lucanet offers a cloud‑based, ERP‑agnostic platform that consolidates finance, tax, planning and ESG reporting into a single, governed source of truth. The solution now supports over 6,000 customers in more than 50 countries, replacing fragmented spreadsheets with real‑time, audit‑ready data....
From Compliance to Revenue: Ozone API Launches Guide to Help Banks Commercialise Open Banking
Ozone API, founded by the original architects of the UK open‑banking standard, has released a free "Commercialising Open Banking" guide. The resource outlines a three‑tier framework—foundational, premium, and distribution APIs—to help banks shift from compliance‑only thinking to revenue‑generating models. It...
Ctrl Alt Secures FCA Authorisation to Expand UK Tokenisation Capabilities
Ctrl Alt, a tokenisation infrastructure provider, has secured direct authorisation from the UK Financial Conduct Authority, moving from an appointed representative to an independently regulated investment firm. The FCA licence allows the company to expand its end‑to‑end tokenised‑asset services across...
The Fintech Ecosystem of China in 2026
By 2026 China’s fintech ecosystem remains the world’s largest, driven by a digital economy that accounts for over 40% of its $18 trillion GDP. The sector has shifted from rapid expansion to a regulated, policy‑aligned model, with the People’s Bank of...
Fireblocks and Dynamic Bring Enterprise-Grade Wallet Infrastructure to TON and Telegram
Fireblocks and its embedded‑wallet arm Dynamic have added support for The Open Network (TON) on Telegram Mini Apps. The integration automatically provisions TON wallets and couples them with Fireblocks’ custody, governance and compliance stack, letting developers launch payment, trading and...
From Gen Z to Retirees: Digital Wallets Set to Unlock £453bn in UK Spend by 2030
Global Payments’ 2025‑2030 forecast shows UK digital‑wallet spend surging from £269 bn (≈$342 bn) to £453 bn (≈$575 bn), a 68% jump. Adoption now spans every age group, with 66% of 18‑24‑year‑olds, 29% of 55‑64‑year‑olds and 23% of those 65+ naming wallets their top...
The African Nation of Guinea’s Fintech Landscape in 2026
Guinea’s fintech sector is shifting from ad‑hoc pilots to a state‑backed foundation. The Central Bank has rolled out a national instant payment system that enables 24/7 real‑time transfers across banks, micro‑finance institutions and mobile‑money operators. Regulatory reforms, supported by the...