United Fintech has landed Barclays as its latest banking investor, bringing the British lender onto its board as the fifth major financial institution to back the fintech infrastructure platform in just over two years.The investment puts Barclays alongside BNP Paribas, Citi, Danske Bank and Standard Chartered - all of which have put money into United Fintech since 2023. The company operates as an industry-neutral platform connecting banks, asset managers and wealth managers with fintech solutions."We're excited to partner with United Fintech to accelerate digital transformation across the industry. United Fintech's approach to scaling proven fintech innovation aligns closely with our vision for future-ready financial services," said Ryan Hayward, Head of Strategic Investments at Barclays.Bank-Backed Fintech Portfolio GrowsUnited Fintech has completed two acquisitions this year alone, most recently picking up AI-powered lender Trade Ledger in a share swap deal in November. That followed the April acquisition of CBA, which added trade finance and payments capabilities to the platform.The acquisitions have pushed United Fintech's portfolio to seven fintech companies covering commercial banking, capital markets and investment management. The company now runs 11 offices worldwide with more than 200 employees.Christian Frahm, CEO and founder of United Fintech, pointed to artificial intelligence as a driver for the platform's approach. "With AI accelerating across financial services, industry-wide collaboration has never been more important. With Barclays now onboard, we further strengthen our industry-wide adoption, and United Fintech is well on its way to becoming the trusted ecosystem for enabling that collaboration."Banks Seek Shared Infrastructure PlayThe concentration of major bank investors in a single fintech platform reflects growing interest in shared infrastructure approaches. Instead of building or buying technology independently, banks are backing a common ecosystem where they can access vetted fintech solutions."We remain excited about the prospects of United Fintech delivering real innovation through solutions delivered to well-established financial institutions built on a trusted governance of delivery,” Claus Harder, Head of Group Strategy & M&A at Danske Bank, said. United Fintech was founded in 2020 and operates through a model of selective acquisitions, deep integration and shared infrastructure. The platform handles procurement and deployment of new technology for its financial institution clients.Standard Chartered joined as an investor in August 2024, securing board observer rights as part of its investment. Barclays' deal includes a full board seat, giving the British bank direct input into United Fintech's direction.The company maintains offices in London, New York, Copenhagen, Singapore and the UAE among its 11 locations. This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

Traditional call centers can’t match the speed your business demands. Flyfone is the AI-enhanced cloud contact center built for distributed teams—launch in under an hour, scale without limits, and only pay for what you use. Flyfone – Smart Cloud Contact Center Platform for Distributed Teams 1. About Flyfone Flyfone delivers an AI-enhanced cloud contact center […] The post Flyfone – AI-Powered Cloud Call Center  appeared first on TechBullion.

The University of Oxford and UBS have announced the launch of the Oxford-UBS Centre for Applied AI, a partnership aimed at advancing the understanding of AI and promoting its practical applications. The Centre will involve collaboration between UBS and Oxford Saïd Business School. It will also include the University’s Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences Division (MPLS). Independent research as well as joint initiatives will be conducted at the centre. Researchers will work closely with UBS practitioners to apply findings in real-world contexts. A newly endowed UBS Professor for Applied AI at Oxford Saïd will lead the Centre, supported by a team of 20 researchers. Their work will focus on three areas. The first, AI and Society, includes governance, the future of work, and sustainability. The second, AI for Business and Economy, explores applications that drive innovation and transformation across business and economic ecosystems. The third, AI Futures, examines emerging AI paradigms, model development, and applications. Professor Irene Tracey, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, welcomed the partnership, stating: Professor Irene Tracey “This dynamic multidisciplinary partnership will lead to pioneering new AI research solutions and practical applications at a time of unprecedented technological change. We are grateful to UBS for their vision and support, enabling us to launch the Oxford-UBS Centre for Applied AI.” She added that the partnership would be “unique in its research power, drawing on Oxford’s business school and scientific research division.” Mike Dargan, UBS Group Chief Operations and Technology Officer, said: Mike Dargan “We are delighted that UBS will be partnering with the University of Oxford to foster pioneering AI research and develop practical tools and solutions that can be implemented at scale across our firm, accelerating our journey to become a fully AI-enabled institution and shaping the future of financial services.”     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by freepik The post Oxford University and UBS Launch Centre for Applied AI appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

The "dot plot," Chair Jerome Powell's press conference and estimates for U.S. economic growth and inflation are ways the Fed can rein in sentiment.

Banks have been the backbone of merchant acquiring.  Their regulatory strength, trusted brands, and long-standing merchant relationships established them as the primary enablers of digital payments.  Over the past decade, however, the landscape has evolved rapidly. New-age acquirers—fintechs, orchestration platforms, and digital-first processors—have introduced new levels of speed, flexibility, and intelligence across onboarding, APIs, alternative payment methods, global acceptance, and analytics. This shift does not reflect a lack of capability within banks. Rather, it highlights how quickly technology and merchant expectations have advanced. Banks continue to hold significant advantages: deep trust, compliance expertise, settlement infrastructure, treasury strength, and the ability to serve merchants at scale. By modernising their payments stack and adopting a more software-centric architecture, banks are well-positioned to lead the next phase of innovation in merchant acquiring. The New Competitive Landscape Merchant acquiring is no longer simple transaction processing – it has become a full-stack digital experience.  Businesses today expect a single platform powering payments across web, app, in-store, QR, mobile wallets, and cross-border channels.  They want clear visibility into authorisation rates, routing configurations, fees, and settlements, and the agility to add payment methods instantly. Fintech acquirers anticipated this shift early. They built cloud-native platforms with modular APIs and orchestration layers separating checkout, routing, fraud, tokenisation, FX, and reconciliation.  They ship improvements quickly, integrate regional payment methods in weeks, and offer real-time dashboards with actionable business insights. Banks, by contrast, still often rely on legacy gateways stitched together with multiple vendor systems. Onboarding takes weeks. Dashboards are fragmented. Routing logic is simplistic. Adding alternative payment methods takes months. Cross-border flows depend on outdated treasury processes. The result? Merchants increasingly prefer agile acquirers – even when banks are more trusted. But this isn’t a permanent disadvantage. With the right modernisation strategy and ecosystem partners, banks can match – and surpass – today’s challengers. From Gateways to Platforms: Rethinking the Architecture The first transformation is architectural.  Banks must shift from monolithic gateways to modular, cloud-native payment platforms – where routing, fraud, tokenisation, settlement, and reconciliation operate as separate, scalable services. This enables rapid integration of new payment methods like UPI, PayNow, Mada, or wallets; ensures omnichannel consistency; and accelerates product updates.  More importantly, it gives merchants a unified interface rather than fragmented portals and reporting systems. Several global banks are already pursuing this path – often partnering with platforms like Juspay that bring merchant-scale, cloud-native infrastructure that integrates with existing acquiring systems. Reimagining Merchant Experience Banks have traditionally designed their systems around internal processes – risk, compliance, settlement cycles, and batch systems.  Today, however, merchants expect consumer-grade experiences. They want: Digital-first onboarding with modern APIs, SDKs, and sandbox environments – in hours, not weeks. Intuitive dashboards that provide deep operational insights into success-rates, declines, and settlements. Self-service capabilities – configuring PG settings, toggling payment methods, setting up webhooks, managing settlements, and more. Banks must treat acquiring as a product, not as a service line. When banks match (or exceed) the merchant experience offered by fintech acquirers, they immediately become competitive again. Success-Rate Engineering: The New Battleground One of the biggest differentiators for modern acquirers is their ability to optimise authorisation rates.  Even a 2–3% uplift can generate millions in additional revenue for merchants. Fintech acquirers invest heavily in real-time routing, intelligent retries, tokenisation, fraud scoring, device intelligence, and BIN-level decisioning. Banks, on the other hand, often rely on static routing logic and legacy fraud systems. But banks hold a hidden advantage – closer issuer relationships and deeper visibility into network-level patterns.  Once modernised with real-time decisioning and adaptive routing, banks can outperform fintechs and shift merchant preference. Competing in a Global Economy Payments are no longer local. Even mid-sized merchants operate in multiple markets, and expect multi-currency pricing, local settlement, transparent FX, and compliance with local regulatory frameworks such as SCA or data localisation.  They also expect support for local payment methods – wallets, account-to-account systems, national rails, and open-banking-based payments. Banks must evolve from card-only acquiring to universal acceptance. Orchestration platforms are essential here – they enable banks to adopt new rails rapidly without lengthy integration cycles. The Role of AI and Data Banks sit on some of the richest datasets in financial infrastructure – issuer authorisation patterns, merchant risk behaviour, cross-border insights, and interchange flows. Historically, this data lived in silos. Modern platforms change this. AI can predict issuer declines, optimise routing paths, enable adaptive fraud prevention, drive dynamic pricing, and provide merchants with performance intelligence. Data is no longer a back-office asset – it is a competitive advantage. Path to Modernisation The transformation process requires both technology and organisational change. Banks must build cross-functional product-led teams and adopt a merchant-centric operating model.  Equally important is building an ecosystem rather than going solo – working with orchestration providers, risk platforms, APM aggregators, and infrastructure partners such as Juspay to accelerate delivery and expand coverage. Modernisation happens in phases – starting with orchestration and unified APIs, and progressing toward AI-driven routing, dynamic fee engines, expanded payment method coverage, and real-time operational intelligence. The goal is not to rebuild everything – but to combine bank-grade trust with modern agility. Banks Can Win This Race The rise of fintech acquirers does not signal the decline of banks – it signals the need for reinvention. Banks remain uniquely positioned to win in merchant acquiring, backed by trust, scale, and regulatory credibility.  What they need is a modern, modular, intelligence-driven payments stack that puts merchants at the centre. The question is not whether banks can compete – it’s which banks will modernise fast enough to win. Featured image by romanshashko via Freepik. The post Modernising Bank Payments: How Banks Can Win in Merchant Acquiring appeared first on Fintech Singapore.

Innovative software aids in financial crime prevention for firms. Highlights: FCA introduces Firm Checker tool for UK financial firms. Aims to improve compliance with financial crime regulations. Software offers essential resources for combating financial crime. Enhances safety measures for both firms and customers. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has launched the Firm Checker tool, designed to assist UK financial firms in combating financial crime. This resource will provide vital information and guidance for firms, helping them ensure regulatory compliance. By integrating this software into their operations, firms can enhance their ability to detect and prevent financial crime. The initiative is part of the FCA’s broader effort to strengthen the UK’s financial ecosystem against illicit activities.

Real-time generative media platform fal today announced a $140 million Series D financing, bringing its funding to over $400 million. Türkiye-founded, fal is an infrastructure layer for real-time AI-generated content, enabling developers and enterprises to run any model—open-source, private, or commercial—through a single, ultra-low-latency serverless API. The platform automatically scales globally and eliminates DevOps overhead, allowing teams to deploy generative applications in minutes rather than months. Today, fal powers millions of developers and hundreds of enterprise teams across commerce, design, entertainment, and emerging AI-native categories. Customers rely on Fal for applications ranging from real-time video generation to hyper-personalised media, immersive creative tools, and advertising workflows. The financing follows the $125 million Series C announced in July 2025 for fal. At that time, the company had more than tripled its revenue since 2024 and surpassed 2+ million developers using the platform. The company previously raised $49 million in Series B funding in February this year. Demand has continued to accelerate at historic speed: fal has more than doubled its run-rate in four months. Developer and enterprise usage surged further, with billions of real-time generative assets served monthly across image, video, audio, and 3D. Team size tripled in 2025, as the company scaled engineering, product, and go-to-market teams to meet global demand. fal also completed one strategic acquisition and launched multiple new product lines, expanding its reach across real-time AI workflows. The round is led by Sequoia, with participation from Kleiner Perkins and new investment from NVentures, NVIDIA’s venture capital arm, and Alkeon Capital. The round also includes continued support from existing investors Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Kindred Ventures, Meritech, Bessemer Venture Partners, Notable Capital, Shopify Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, and others. “Sequoia, Kleiner Perkins and NVentures joining fal is a powerful signal about where generative media is heading—and who is going to define it,” said Burkay Gur, co-founder and CEO of fal. “Developers and enterprises are building entirely new categories of applications around real-time, personalised, generative content. fal is the infrastructure that makes that possible at a global scale.” “fal's momentum has been undeniable—developers and enterprises kept telling us they were the platform to use for creating media with AI,” said Sonya Huang, Partner at Sequoia. “As inference is one of the largest technology markets and video its most demanding slice, fal's speed, model selection, and workflow and collaboration features position them to define the category. We’re proud to back a team enabling high‑quality, AI‑generated video at scale.” The Series D funding will accelerate hiring across go-to-market and engineering, support the continued development of new product lines, and expand fal’s global infrastructure footprint to meet the rapidly rising demand.

Social trading and investment network eToro unveiled that it will begin rolling out its stock lending program in the UK. The capability, which is available in Europe and the UK, enables eligible users to lend out their stocks. Stock lending isn’t new. In fact, it has long been a passive revenue generator for large brokers and hedge funds. Bringing this capability to an alternative platform like eToro gives the fintech a competitive edge as it brings more transparent, value-added services to the retail trading market. As investor expectations increase, platforms that provide passive-income engines, improved liquidity, and greater control over their portfolios may gain more interest in an ever-crowded market. Facilitating the launch are global financial services company BNY and stock lending program EquiLend. Under these partnerships, BNY is acting as custodian and clearing provider, while EquiLend identifies borrowers and facilitates the lending process. eToro anticipates that the new program will allow its investors to put their portfolios to work while retaining their investments. As with most stock lending programs, borrowers post collateral, and investors can still sell their positions at any time. By partnering with institutions such as BNY and EquiLend, eToro aims to ensure operational safeguards that offer retail users institutional-grade risk management. “Launching stock lending in the UK is a key step in our mission to make passive income opportunities available to every investor,” said eToro VP of Execution Services Yossi Brandes. “With the ability to lend not just US but also global stocks, we are maximizing the potential for our clients to generate additional revenues, and this rollout sets the stage for further expansion into new markets.”  Launching in the UK expands eToro’s partnership with BNY, which it leverages for clearing and custody services for its stock and ETF offering across 19 global exchanges. “We are delighted to extend our relationship with eToro, delivering an integrated solution encompassing clearing, settlement, custody, foreign exchange and cash management to UK investors,” said BNY Executive Platform Owner of Global Clearing Victor O’Laughlen. “By combining the capabilities of eToro and EquiLend with the scale and deep expertise of BNY’s leading Global Clearing platform, this initiative aims to equip retail investors with an institutional-grade solution to support their investing journey.” Israel-based eToro said that the move marks the next step in the company’s plan to expand stock lending access to retail investors worldwide. For eToro, today’s launch is more than a feature. The expansion is a signal of the company’s strategic move into deeper monetization and institutional-grade services. Leveraging BNY’s clearing and custody infrastructure places eToro closer to the operational standards of traditional brokers while maintaining its core social-trading product. Adding features like these in partnerships with traditional financial institutions could help eToro attract more sophisticated retail investors looking for passive-income tools and greater flexibility. Founded in 2007, eToro has since raised $693 million in funding. With more than 35 million registered users and investors on its trading and investing platform, the company offers trading and investing tools that are more accessible and collaborative. eToro launched in the US market in 2019, entering a space where Robinhood had already established a six-year presence. eToro began 2025 with its public debut in May. The company is now listed on Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker ETOR. eToro has a current market capitalization of $3.5 billion. Photo by John Angel on Unsplash The post eToro Brings Stock Lending to the UK appeared first on Finovate.       

Marquis said ransomware hackers stole reams of banking customer data, containing personal information and financial records, as well as Social Security numbers, belonging to hundreds of thousands of people. The number of affected people is expected to rise.