Late last week, a handful of the largest US banks revealed a plan to launch their own tokenized deposit network. JPMorgan, Citi, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and other major banks will launch the new network, which is set to launch by mid-2027. The banks are launching this new network in partnership with The Clearing House (TCH), a bank-owned consortium that operates critical US payment infrastructure, including the RTP network, which enables real-time payments between participating financial institutions. The initiative will connect traditional banking infrastructure with blockchain-based payments while keeping deposits inside the banking system. Here are five things banks and fintechs should know. TradFi’s answer to stablecoins With a market value of more than $316 billion, stablecoins are no longer a crypto experiment. Stablecoin issuance is projected to reach between $3 trillion and $4 trillion by 2030. This growth has the attention of some of the largest banks in the world, warranting a coordinated response. Similar to stablecoins, a tokenized network offers 24/7 infrastructure and programmable payments, allowing banks to deliver many of the benefits associated with stablecoins. Most notably, the tokenized deposits network will not require customers to move funds outside the traditional banking system, meaning banks will be able to retain their deposits. Because tokenized deposits are still bank deposits, they retain the same regulatory treatment, accounting treatment, and credit-risk profile as traditional deposits. Tokenized deposits are different from traditional deposits in that they are represented on blockchain infrastructure instead of existing bank ledgers. It’s about controlling infrastructure For much of the past decade, fintech competition centered on who could best distribute products and services. Fintechs and banks competed to acquire customers, launch new apps, and build better digital experiences. Recently, however, firms have shifted their focus to controlling the infrastructure that powers financial services. This race toward infrastructure can be seen in Stripe acquiring Bridge to gain stablecoin infrastructure, Visa’s and Mastercard’s recent investment in stablecoin settlement capabilities, and in banks’ efforts to build tokenized deposit networks. Rather than competing for customer relationships, these companies are positioning themselves to own the rails that move money. The new tokenized deposit network creates a shared infrastructure layer for programmable deposits and real-time settlement, allowing participating banks to ensure they remain at the center of digital money movement. The initial target is corporate treasury, not consumers The new tokenized deposits network will initially be aimed at corporate treasury, which means it will likely not reach consumers before 2028. TCH expects early demand to come from multinational corporations seeking treasury automation, real-time liquidity management, cross-border payments, and programmable payments. These are the same use cases that have helped stablecoins gain traction among businesses. While some of these workflows and use cases are applicable to retail clients, businesses stand to benefit the most from real-time settlement, programmable payments, and always-on liquidity management. For that reason, the battle between tokenized deposits and stablecoins may take place in corporate treasury long before it reaches the consumer wallet. A tokenized network offers 24/7 infrastructure One of the biggest benefits of blockchain-based payments is that they do not operate on traditional banking schedules that have batch processing at the end of each day. The new proposed network would allow tokenized deposits to settle 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This continuous movement helps banks compete with stablecoin networks that already offer near-instant transfers at any time. Smaller institutions will eventually need a position With large financial institutions taking the lead on this new tokenized deposits network, where does that leave smaller community banks and credit unions? These smaller institutions will need to find their role in a world where money increasingly moves on programmable infrastructure. Fortunately for these smaller institutions, the network is expected to be available to banks across the US, not just the largest institutions. As different digital asset infrastructure matures, financial institutions may need to determine their stance on whether they will issue, connect to, custody, or simply enable access to these new forms of digital money. Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash The post 5 Things to Know about TradFi’s Move to Control Digital Money Infrastructure appeared first on Finovate.       

Klarna launched a high-yield savings account paying up to 3.38% APY, adding deposits and savings tools to its growing portfolio of consumer financial products. The move builds on Klarna’s existing banking ambitions. The company already holds $12.3 billion in deposits globally and has offered interest-bearing accounts in Europe since 2021. As Klarna expands from BNPL into savings, payments, P2P transfers, and stablecoins, it is increasingly positioning itself as a full-service digital bank rather than a standalone payments provider. Digital payments app Klarna is starting to look more like a bank ecosystem. The Sweden-based company has launched a high-yield savings account, adding to its existing suite of banking tools. The fintech’s new savings account, which currently pays 3.38% APY or higher, does not require a minimum deposit, charge monthly fees, or require a direct deposit. It also offers built-in tools like round-ups, scheduled transfers, and savings goals. While Klarna is partnering with FDIC-insured WebBank, which is holding the funds, users can fund the account in the Klarna app. Klarna already offers flexible payment tools, debit and credit payment cards, a shopping platform, and mobile telco plans. Savings is a natural next step for Klarna, especially since the company has offered interest-bearing accounts in Europe since 2021. Today, the company holds $12.3 billion in deposits across eleven markets. “The average American earns less than half a percent on their savings, not because better options don’t exist, but because their bank hasn’t had to compete,” said Klarna CEO and Co-founder Sebastian Siemiatkowski. “Klarna is already where millions of Americans manage their everyday spending. Now it’s where they save too.” As with many high-yield savings accounts, the percentage yield on Klarna’s new savings account is subject to change. According to the fine print, users can open up to three accounts and can boost their APY by becoming a Klarna member. The higher yield will be paid on balances of up to $50,000. The new launch follows Klarna’s move into the public markets after its IPO in September of 2025. Today, the company counts over 119 million global active users and 3.4 million transactions per day. While it has not provided updated figures for its Balance accounts, Klarna reported that its Balance accounts held $14 billion in 2025. Given the higher yield that the new savings accounts pay, it is reasonable to assume that much of the funds in the Balance accounts will be moved to the new savings accounts. Klarna debuted peer-to-peer (P2P) capabilities in 13 European markets earlier this year. And while it has not yet launched similar P2P capabilities in the US, the company will likely do so after it moves its stablecoin (KlarnaUSD) from a testnet to the mainnet. The launch of the savings account places Klarna another step closer to becoming a full-service digital bank. Klarna has built its brand around buy now, pay later, but is increasingly expanding into deposits, payments, and everyday banking. The post Klarna Unveils High Yield Savings Account appeared first on Finovate.       

Digital banking solutions provider Mahalo Banking has partnered with Members First Credit Union of Utah. Members First CU will deploy Mahalo’s Thoughtful Banking platform as part of an overall modernization initiative that will also involve a transition to the Corelation Keystone core platform. Mahalo Banking, based in Troy, Michigan, won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2023 in New York. Jim Stickley is CEO. Utah-based Members First Credit Union has teamed up with Mahalo Banking as part of a technology modernization drive that will involve the financial institution deploying Mahalo’s Thoughtful Banking platform as well as transitioning to the Corelation Keystone core platform. Members First CU CEO Darryn Hodgson indicated that selecting a digital banking provider that could evolve with the institution was key. Hodgson also praised Mahalo’s culture, level of commitment, and collaboration, noting that it reflected “the same member-first philosophy that drives our credit union.” Mahalo’s Thoughtful Banking platform will provide improved mobile functionality and a streamlined overall experience for the credit union’s members, with enhanced digital account opening capabilities to be introduced later after the initial launch. Hodgson added that ease of use was another major factor in choosing Mahalo, which is known for its incorporation of neurodiverse functionality that helps financial institutions serve customers and members with a range of cognitive and sensory challenges. “We have members across multiple generations,” Hodgson said, “and it was important to choose a solution that was approachable and easy to navigate.” In addition to deploying Mahalo’s Thoughtful Banking, Members First CU will also transition to the Corelation Keystone core platform. Mahalo’s solution will serve as the member-facing digital experience for Members First CU, delivering online, digital, and mobile banking functionality. “Credit unions today need technology partners that are flexible, responsive, and committed to continuous collaboration,” Mahalo COO Denny Howell said. “Members First is taking a thoughtful approach to modernization by aligning its digital banking and core strategies around long-term agility and member experience. We are proud to support its team with a platform designed to simplify the member journey while enabling faster innovation and stronger operational flexibility.” A member-focused financial cooperative, Members First Credit Union was founded in 1958 and serves communities in northern Utah. Launched as the Thiokol Employees Credit Union, the financial institution has grown into a 13,000-member entity with more than $206 million in assets. Members First Credit Union offers a full range of financial services including deposit accounts, consumer lending, credit cards, home equity loans, and digital banking solutions. Mahalo Banking won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2023 in New York. At the conference, the Troy, Michigan-based fintech demonstrated its online banking solution that fully integrates comprehensive neurodiverse functionality directly into its platform. The functionality enables credit unions to support a wider range of members, including those with unique needs due to autism, dyslexia, epilepsy, ADD/ADHD, color blindness, and more. Mahalo Banking’s partnership announcement with Members First Credit Union comes just weeks after the fintech reported that CU Hawai’i Federal Credit Union had selected its Thoughtful Banking platform. The decision is also part of a strategic dual implementation that saw the credit union announce a core conversion to Corelation Keystone. “The feedback we received from other credit unions about Mahalo’s platform and partnership approach was overwhelmingly positive,” CU Hawai’i President and CEO James Takamine said. “Beyond the technology, it was clear that Mahalo’s team and culture are truly aligned with how we serve our members. The dedicated focus on usability, security, and collaboration made Mahalo the clear choice for our long-term digital strategy, especially as we undergo our core conversion to Keystone.” Photo by Nils Huenerfuerst on Unsplash The post Members First Credit Union Partners with Mahalo Banking appeared first on Finovate.       

For companies involved in the business of empowering developers to build business-critical fintech applications, the world has changed a great deal over the past decade. From the rise of AI to a sea-change in regulatory priorities that has increased scrutiny on third-party relationships, fraud and risk management, consumer data protections, and more, the task of providing fintech developers with the tools they need to innovate has only become more challenging. This makes the recent news from 3forge, a New York-based fintech that has been empowering fintech designers and developers for 15 years, all the more interesting. “We started 3forge in New York, in 2011, to build a transformative platform enabling your designers and developers to build applications in a fraction of the time and cost, with a focus on business-critical scale, performance, and interoperability,” 3forge Founder and Chief Technology Officer Robert Cooke said from the Finovate stage at the beginning of the company’s Finovate debut in 2022. Today, the New York-based fintech announced the launch of its application fabric for finance. 3forge Enterprise unifies real-time data, business logic, AI, and application development in a single operational environment. This gives financial institutions a production-ready continuum from data to deployed application. 3forge Enterprise provides a data gateway that unifies current-state access to real-time and historical tables, streams, and procedures across data nodes in the 3forge fabric. The technology enables developers and applications to publish, subscribe, query, and insert data via native connectivity in Java, Python, and C++, and provides failover support and integrations across JDBC, Pandas, and SQLAlchemy libraries. 3forge Enterprise also provides MCP server and AI agent access, live prompting and agentic development, and an operations hub that centralizes the management of 3forge deployments. “For years, financial institutions treated data platforms, business logic, and applications as separate architectural domains,” Cooke said. “That separation made sense operationally, but it is increasingly inefficient for high-value capital markets workflows. As AI raises the stakes, models and agents need more than disconnected data estates and fragmented application logic.” 3forge Enterprise uses three layers to transform platforms into an enterprise-wide fabric for financial systems: a governed real-time intake and exhaust layer for financial data, an application engine and AI-assisted development layer for building and running financial workflows that helps users move from data to production, and an operational control layer to facilitate managing deployments at scale. Combined, these layers enable vendor platforms, internal systems, and AI-powered applications to access real-time and historical data via unified queries, streams, APIs, and agents. At the same time, 3forge Enterprise preserves the entitlements, auditability, and production controls needed for capital markets. “An application fabric brings data, decisions, execution, AI, and applications onto the same controlled, auditable foundation,” Cooke explained. “For tier-one financial institutions, 3forge Enterprise provides a way to extend and modernize complex existing infrastructure. For mid-market banks, broker-dealers, hedge funds, and asset managers, it provides access to a production-ready application fabric without having to build one from scratch.” Founded in 2011 and headquartered in New York, 3forge made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022. At the conference, the company showed how its Full Stack Enterprise platform enables developers to quickly build customized business-critical solutions with an emphasis on workflow transparency, real-time visualization, and data discovery without limitation. Photo by Vincenzo Marotta on Unsplash The post 3forge Unveils Application Fabric for Finance, 3forge Enterprise appeared first on Finovate.       

Stripe-owned stablecoin infrastructure platform Bridge is partnering with Banking Circle to enable clients to move stablecoins into and out of local currencies, with support for EUR, GBP, USD, and soon AUD. The partnership combines Bridge’s stablecoin capabilities with Banking Circle’s regulated banking infrastructure, correspondent banking network, and local clearing access to facilitate cross-border payments and fiat-to-stablecoin conversions. The deal reflects the growing convergence of traditional banking and stablecoin infrastructure, as businesses increasingly seek regulated on- and off-ramps that make stablecoins practical for everyday global payments. Banking Circle, a Luxembourg-based bank, announced today that Stripe-owned stablecoin infrastructure platform Bridge is using it to move money across the globe. Banking Circle’s money movement infrastructure enables Bridge’s clients to move stablecoins in and out of local currencies. Currently, Banking Circle supports EUR and GBP, and plans to offer support for AUD in the third quarter of this year. Bridge will also use Banking Circle’s SWIFT capabilities to allow its clients to send and receive USD. By offering stablecoin on- and off-ramps to and from local currencies, Bridge is giving its clients the flexibility to send and receive payments in multiple European currencies without having to worry about holding the currencies themselves. “As payment businesses continue to expand globally, access to reliable, scalable banking infrastructure is critical,” said Banking Circle Chief Digital Assets Officer Kirit Bhatia. “Banking Circle provides regulated banking rails, local clearing access, multi-currency accounts and cross-border payment capabilities through a single integration, helping companies simplify operations and accelerate growth in new markets.” As a fully regulated, licensed bank, Banking Circle offers Bridge access to its correspondent banking network for global payments. The company was founded in 2013 to provide payments, banking, and lending infrastructure to financial institutions and regulated payment businesses. The partnership highlights the growing convergence between stablecoin infrastructure providers and traditional banking institutions. While Bridge offers businesses a way to move value using stablecoins, Banking Circle provides the regulated banking rails, local clearing access, and correspondent banking relationships needed to move funds into and out of local currencies. “Banking Circle’s API-led infrastructure and multi-currency capabilities support our continued global expansion,” said Bridge Head of Product Mai Leduc Blount. “By making it seamless for businesses to convert between fiat and stablecoins, we ensure that any business can use stablecoins for everyday expenses, all around the world.” Bridge was founded in 2022 to serve as an alternative payment method to compete with SWIFT and credit cards and was acquired by Stripe in 2024 for $1.1 billion. Bridge’s technology allows businesses to move, store, and accept stablecoins using just a few lines of code. The company’s Issuance APIs help clients issue their own stablecoin and accept USD, EUR, USDC, USDT or any other stablecoin. Photo by Tom Fisk The post Banking Circle to Power Money Movement for Bridge appeared first on Finovate.       

Pay-by-bank provider Aeropay has teamed up with banking technology and modernization company Jack Henry. Aeropay will integrate with Jack Henry Payments Orchestrator to boost its bank integration capabilities and enhance its pay-by-bank network. Founded in 1976 and celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, Jack Henry has been a Finovate alum since 2010. The company is based in Monett, Missouri. Pay-by-bank provider Aeropay announced an integration with Jack Henry that will help the company expand its instant payments capabilities and boost the resilience of its national pay-by-bank network. Aeropay is integrating with Jack Henry Payments Orchestrator (formerly Victor Technologies) to not only enhance its bank integration capabilities, but also to introduce new payment rail infrastructure throughout its ecosystem. “Bank payments just got more reliable,” Aeropay noted on its LinkedIn page when the news was announced. “Aeropay just integrated with Jack Henry, expanding our real-time payment infrastructure and adding smart routing across our network. For merchants, that means even fewer failed payments and faster funds. The integration is live.” The integration enables request-for-payment (RfP) and real-time payment (RTP) capabilities, enhancing Aeropay’s multi-rail architecture. Aeropay will be able to dynamically route transactions based on performance, availability, and risk conditions. As RfP and RTP networks continue to expand to more and more US financial institutions, this architecture improves uptime, accelerates transactions, and offers greater flexibility for instant payment acceptance and settlement. Chicago, Illinois-based Aeropay offers a national pay-by-bank network that outperforms cards, cash, and checks with a multi-rail payment infrastructure that includes ACH, RTP, RfP, and FedNow capabilities. Aeropay makes it easy for companies to add and scale bank connections, pay-by-bank, instant payouts, and AI risk prevention. The firm’s pay-by-bank offering lowers processing costs by 50% and helps accelerate cash flow with payments that settle same-day (or faster). Aeropay’s pay-by-bank network also features built-in risk prevention, preventing returns and eliminating chargebacks via real-time verification, AI risk scoring, network intelligence, and guaranteed settlement. A Finovate alum since 2010, Jack Henry & Associates serves banks, credit unions, fintechs, and businesses with comprehensive, cloud-native solutions that unify core, digital, and other services into a single, adaptable ecosystem. Jack Henry offers financial institutions a range of internally developed modern capabilities as well as the ability to integrate with innovative fintech technologies. Currently celebrating its 50th year, Jack Henry serves more than 7,500 community and regional banks and credit unions with solutions for digital banking, payments, lending, fraud risk, and more. Jack Henry & Associates is headquartered in Monett, Missouri. Greg Adelson is President and Chief Executive Officer. Photo by Chris Dickens on Unsplash The post Aeropay Integrates with Jack Henry to Extend Pay-by-Bank Capabilities appeared first on Finovate.       

Banking technology company Temenos announced its acquisition of Swiss fintech additiv in a half-cash, half-equity transaction. The acquisition will bolster Temenos’ wealth management franchise with additiv’s out-of-the-box orchestration and mass affluent capabilities. Both Temenos and additiv made their Finovate debuts at FinovateEurope 2013 in London. Banking technology firm Temenos has agreed to acquire Swiss fintech additiv. The 50/50 cash and equity deal is expected to be completed early in Q3 of 2026. Additiv offers a specialist platform to orchestrate financial services. The company’s technology integrates process steps and data into a single orchestration layer for wealth and other financial workflows. With 30 clients in wealth management, banking, and insurance, additiv’s technology enables banks and wealth managers to rapidly design and launch wealth propositions that boost advisor productivity, orchestrate investment propositions, and provide consistent client experiences at scale. With an extensive global client base in the wealth space, Temenos will benefit from additiv’s native mass-affluent capabilities and AI-enabled orchestration layer. The company’s fast, low-risk implementation model offers deployments in as little as 3-6 months compared to the industry standard of 12 months. With a high Net Promoter Score (NPS) above 90, Net Revenue Retention (NRR) of 138%, and double-digit growth over the past three years, additiv will enable Temenos to expand its client footprint within investment services in both developed and emerging markets, as well as provide Temenos’ wealth clients with future-ready, front office workflows. “This acquisition strengthens our wealth proposition at a time when we see strong, growing demand for our products across tiers and geographies in the wealth segment, with financial institutions increasingly focused on launching scalable hybrid wealth models,” additiv founder Michael Stemmie said. “additiv’s orchestration capabilities complement our market-leading platform and support our strategy to help clients deliver personalized, regulatory compliant wealth services efficiently and at scale. Together, additiv’s AI-powered orchestration capabilities and Temenos’ existing front-end solutions create strong differentiation at the banking experience layer.” Temenos offers a core banking suite and modular composable solutions to help banks and other financial institutions modernize their operations. Deployable on-premises, via the cloud, or as a SaaS solution, Temenos’ technology empowers financial institutions of all sizes to deliver innovative, AI-enhanced experiences to their customers. Founded in 1993 and based in Geneva, Switzerland, Temenos today serves more than 950 core banking and 600 digital banking clients. Thibault de Tersant is Temenos Chairman. Takis Spiliopoulos is Chief Executive Officer (and interim Chief Financial Officer). Headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland and founded in 1998, additiv offers an API-first, cloud-based financial services orchestration platform that enables financial institutions and brands to launch, automate, and scale financial services from a singular solution. Empowering companies in wealth management, banking, credit, and insurance, additiv’s technology allows firms to expand their own offerings and introduce third-party products and services to their customers without having to replace core systems. A Finovate alum since 2013, additiv most recently demoed its technology at FinovateAsia 2017 in Hong Kong. Earlier this year, additiv launched a new dedicated solution to help Germans navigate planned reforms to the country’s pension scheme. The reform calls for a new state-subsidized retirement investment account (Altersvorsorgedepot) that is offered digitally as a simplified, standardized solution, Standarddepot. Millions of legacy pensions (so-called “Riester” contracts) will be migrated to the new pension product, creating new urgency for institutions that seek to attract or simply retain these customers. “This reform marks a genuine paradigm shift for German private pensions,” additiv CEO Nils Frowein said. “For the first time, capital market-based products are sitting at the heart of state-subsidized retirement savings. Institutions that are now establishing scalable digital infrastructure will secure long-term customer relationships—and with millions of Riester contracts up for migration, the window to act is open.” Photo by Henrique Ferreira on Unsplash The post Temenos Acquires Swiss Wealth Management Orchestration Platform additiv appeared first on Finovate.       

Reset raised $6 million in seed funding from credit union customers and partners to expand its embedded earned wage access platform for credit unions and community banks. The company positions earned wage access as a tool to deepen relationships and grow deposits, reporting that cardholders increase deposits by 27%, maintain 36% higher balances, and generate 20% more interchange revenue. Credit unions increasingly view earned wage access as competitive infrastructure to defend primary financial relationships against digital banks and neobanks. Embedded earned wage access platform Reset unveiled today that it has raised $6 million in seed funding. The investment, which comes from credit union customers and strategic partners in the credit union and community banking space, boosts Reset’s total funding to more than $8 million. Reset will use the funds to expand its sales and implementation capacity, deepen product development, and accelerate existing deployments. California-based Reset, which aims to serve credit unions and community banks, embeds its technology directly into financial institutions’ existing technology stacks to enable members to access their earned wages on a daily basis, fee-free, via a card issued by the credit union or community bank. “When your customers lead your funding round, there is no clearer market signal,” said Reset CEO and Co-founder Matt Dicou. “These credit unions aren’t just writing a check. They’re making a decision about where they want to take their members, their institutions, and the credit union industry. They see that Chime and other neobanks are successfully recruiting people away from credit unions today. Our credit union partners already have trusted member relationships. We give them what they need to remain the primary financial home.” Reset anticipates that the earned wage card will help financial institutions grow direct deposits, since the more a member deposits, the more real-time funds they can access. The company said that cardholders increase deposits held at their credit union by 27% and maintain checking account balances 36% higher than before switching cards. In addition to the earned wage feature, Reset also helps credit unions generate credit interchange revenue on cardholder’s everyday spend. The company said that its cardholders generate 20% more in credit interchange revenue for their institution. Rather than viewing earned wage access as simply another product offering, many credit unions increasingly see these tools as infrastructure to defend primary financial relationships, capture direct deposits, and compete against digital banks. As neobanks continue using faster access to money as a customer acquisition tool, features like earned wage access may become table stakes rather than differentiators. Georgia’s Own Credit Union’s investment in Reset highlights this shift from product experimentation toward competitive infrastructure. “Our members are already looking for this, and until now, they’ve had to turn to other options,” said Georgia’s Own Credit Union CTO Kevan Williamson. “Reset levels the playing field for our members. We invested because we’ve seen what it does for members’ financial stability, and because we believe credit unions should be the ones offering it.” Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash The post Reset Lands $6 Million in Seed Funding for Embedded Earned Wage Access appeared first on Finovate.       

While many banks are still trying to create their stablecoin strategy (or decide to pursue a stablecoin strategy), some of the largest players in payments, acquiring, exchanges, and financial infrastructure are exploring a stablecoin collaboration. CoinDesk reported that payments giants Stripe, Visa, and Mastercard are backing a stablecoin platform, while Coinbase is considering involvement. The move could challenge the dominance that Circle and Tether have on the stablecoin industry by helping standardize digital currency routing across legacy systems What impact will this disruption have on players in the traditional space? Here are a few implications. Stablecoin interoperability improves As with many new enabling technologies in banking and fintech, stablecoins are quite fragmented. Even though Circle and Tether dominate issuance, moving stablecoins across wallets, exchanges, payment providers, and legacy financial infrastructure remains complex. Additionally, there is no universally accepted framework for how digital currency moves across financial infrastructure. While both of these factors limit mainstream adoption, a consortium backed by companies such as Visa, Mastercard, Stripe, and Coinbase could help create a common framework that makes digital currency movement feel more like existing payment infrastructure. For financial services providers in the traditional finance (TradFi) space, this common framework could help decrease integration costs, making stablecoin connectivity easier to implement. The shared framework could lower integration costs by reducing the number of connections banks and fintechs must build and maintain. A standardized ecosystem could potentially offer more consistent routing, settlement, and compliance processes. Importantly, the standardization would mean that banks would be able to act now instead of waiting for the winning standard to emerge. Stablecoins become infrastructure instead of products Right now, much of the conversation around stablecoins focuses on which company issues the token used for a transaction. Consumers, however, rarely care which payment rail, settlement network, or digital asset powers their transaction. Instead, they simply expect money movement to be fast, seamless, and secure. For banks and fintechs, this may mean that owning the token itself becomes less important than controlling the infrastructure surrounding money movement. When consumers are rails agnostic, we may start to see that the companies that facilitate routing, settlement, custody, compliance, and customer experiences gain a competitive advantage over those that issue the underlying asset. Economics of traditional payments face new pressure Stablecoins are likely here to stay, but they will not replace cards, wires, or ACH payments. However, if major payment players like Visa and Mastercard help introduce new stablecoin infrastructure, it could create pressure on existing payment economics. For example, cross-border payments and merchant settlement could become faster and potentially less expensive. This increased competition, even if only viable in certain use cases, could reduce margins and force traditional financial institutions to reconsider where they create value. Because both Visa and Mastercard have a stake in traditional payments, however, they are unlikely to introduce a structure that will eliminate traditional payment revenues altogether. Instead, there will likely be gradual pressure on pricing and a shift toward monetizing new infrastructure layers rather than existing friction. Stablecoin strategy becomes harder to postpone It is clear that stablecoins are no longer fringe, and at this point, sitting on the sidelines becomes a strategic decision. While it used to be acceptable to treat stablecoins like an optional experiment, the involvement of established financial infrastructure companies makes it mandatory to understand stablecoins. Traditional financial institutions of all sizes need to consider if they will issue stablecoins, custody them, connect to them, or simply enable customer access. While the “wait and see” approach is still a valid strategy, at this stage it is more of an active strategic decision instead of a passive delay. Financial institutions that choose not to participate should do so intentionally, taking into consideration which revenue opportunities, customer segments, and payment flows they may be willing to forgo if adoption accelerates. Photo by Thirdman The post Why Banks Should Pay Attention to a Visa–Mastercard–Stripe–Coinbase Stablecoin Alliance appeared first on Finovate.       

Finovate’s Fintech Rundown is back with the fintech headlines you need to know as the working week begins! We’ve got news of a funding in the consumer financing world, new products for financial wellness and credit trading, a collaboration in the money movement market and more. Be sure to check back all week long for the latest in fintech headlines. Financial wellness The US arm of BMO launches an new app developed by MSN Holding, DollarGPS, to help users improve their financial health. Lending Egyptian Buy Now, Pay Later firm Blnk raises $37 million in combined debt and equity funding. Digital banking Backbase announces a strategic collaboration with Mastercard to integrate its money movement capabilities, Mastercard Move, into Backbase Banking OS. Credit, data, and analytics TP ICAP unveils new credit trading and data platform, RealQ. Credit intelligence platform Octus acquires LevPro, a front-office software provider for public and private credit markets. Agentic AI Spend management software provider Expensify launches Expensify MCP, a new integration that enables AI assistants and other MCP-compatible clients to securely access Expensify data via natural language queries. Payments Wallester UK secures authorization from the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) as an Electronic Money Institution. XTransfer and Societe Generale team up to streamline cross-border payments. Aeropay integrates with Jack Henry to grow its real-time, pay-by-bank infrastructure in the US. Financial crime and fraud prevention Klarna offers in-app inbox that consolidates all official communications in an effort to keep customers safe from impersonation scams. Photo by Sergey Shmidt on Unsplash The post Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News appeared first on Finovate.       

This week’s edition of Finovate Global looks at recent fintech headlines from the Eastern European nations of Bulgaria, Albania, and Hungary. Bulgarian Fintech Paypercut Raises €5M Paypercut, a fintech based in Sofia, Bulgaria, has secured €5 million in seed funding. The round was co-led by Concentric, Passion Capital, and Araya Ventures, and featured participation from additional investors including SMOK Ventures, Portfolio Ventures, BrightCap Ventures, BlackWood, SABAH.fund, MFG Invest, Main Set, and Matt Doka, a payment entrepreneur. Paypercut’s total funding now stands at €7 million. Founded in response to the fragmentation of payments in Central and Eastern Europe, Paypercut has grown from a Buy Now, Pay Later aggregator into a more comprehensive payments platform. The company offers merchants access to card payments, local payment options, Buy Now Pay Later products, payment links, QR code payments, multi-currency settlement, and billing tools via a single integration. Paypercut raised €2 million in pre-seed funding in July 2025 and has onboarded more than 200 merchants in eight CEE markets since that time. This week’s investment will help fuel Paypercut’s continued expansion across Central and Eastern Europe. The funding will also enable the firm to meet the capital requirements for an EMI license with the Central Bank of Ireland. “CEE has always been treated as an afterthought by the payments industry, seen as too fragmented, too many local specifics, too complicated,” Paypercut Co-Founder and CEO Stoil Vasilev said. “We built Paypercut to fix that. This round gives us the resources to go further and faster: more markets, more payment options for merchants, and the infrastructure to move money in the way it should have always worked, instantly and at a fraction of the cost.” In addition to its merchant payments operation, Paypercut is also developing stablecoin-based infrastructure for cross-border transfers in the region. The company will initially target high-volume corridors such as those between the Euro and the Polish Zloty (EUR-to-PLN) and the Euro and the Romanian Leu (EUR-to-RON). Albania’s Tirana Bank Goes Live with Backbase Tirana Bank, named “Best Bank in Albania” in 2025 by Euromoney, has gone live with a “complete omnichannel retail banking experience” built on the Backbase AI-native Banking OS. The launch covers accounts, deposits, online loan and credit card applications, internal and outgoing transfers, card management, billpay, and financial insights. Tirana Bank will also enable Digital Assist in the employee app. “This launch marks a significant step in our digital transformation journey, as we continue to invest in solutions that bring real, everyday value to our customers. TiBank+ is designed to deliver a seamless and intuitive banking experience, combining convenience with the trust and human connection that define our model,” Tirana Bank Chief Retail Business Officer Lila Canaj said. “Through our partnership with Backbase, we have accelerated this transformation, bringing to market a modern and scalable platform built to evolve with our customers’ needs.” One feature that Tirana Bank anticipates its customers will appreciate is real-time spending insights, courtesy of Backbase’s personal finance management capabilities. Offering customers these insights is not a common occurrence in the region and will help Tirana Bank differentiate itself from its competitors. The institution is also going live with Apple Pay, becoming one of the few Albanian banks to offer the service via a mobile app. “Albania is on its path to EU membership, its government has made digitalization a national priority,” Backbase Regional Vice President for South East Europe Robert Mihaljek said. “Tirana Bank looked at that moment and decided to lead it. They came to us with a clear ambition. Twelve months later, they are live with not only an MVP but a full retail APP. This is a first for Albania, and a reference for the Balkans.” A four-time Finovate Best of Show winner, Backbase has been a Finovate alum since 2009. The Amsterdam-based fintech offers an AI-native banking operating system that converts fragmented banking operations into a unified frontline for the benefit of customers and employees alike. Founded in 2003, Backbase counts more than 150 leading banks and financial institutions around the world as users of its solutions for retail, small business, commercial, and private banking, as well as wealth management. Riddhi Dutta is CEO. Can Crypto Make a Comeback in Hungary? For many observers, liberal democracy was one of the big winners in the recent Hungarian election that saw the end of the Orbán regime. But could the victory of Péter Magyar and his pro-EU Tisza Party also be a good sign for crypto and digital assets in the country? In 2025, Hungary announced an amended Crypto Act that criminalized unauthorized exchange services and established a validation regime on all crypto-to-fiat and crypto-to-crypto transactions. This incentivized some firms, such as Revolut, to withdraw from the Hungarian market entirely, while others suspended services due to regulatory uncertainty. This also set off a confrontation with the EU, with the European Commission initiating infringement proceedings against Hungary’s validation regime, saying that it was in conflict with the EU’s MiCA framework. Interestingly, Orbán had previously been relatively pro-crypto, with his regime offering some of the lowest tax rates on crypto in Central Europe. This made Hungary—at least before 2025—an attractive jurisdiction for retail crypto investors in the region. There are many reasons offered to explain the shift toward a more restrictive attitude in recent years—from the influence of MiCA and its mandates to the regime’s well-known preference for state control and supervision of key financial and industrial activities. But the question now is whether or not new politics will result in new policy? The correct answer, at this point, is that no one knows. What some observers have noted, however, is Magyar’s relatively more pro-EU stance on other issues and his general interest in re-aligning with European institutions more broadly. To this end, even something as straightforward as revising the country’s crypto policy to match MiCA’s mandates—and remove or revise current criminal penalties for policy violations— might be an initial positive sign toward restoring crypto’s status in Hungary. Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world. Central and Southern Asia India travel fintech Scapia, which combines co-branded cards with travel booking, secured $63 million in funding in a round led by General Catalyst. Raqami Islamic Digital Bank Limited (RIDBL) has been granted a Retail Banking License by the State Bank of Pakistan. The Eurasian Development Bank inked a $70 million loan agreement with IT company Uzum to support the fintech industry in Uzbekistan. Latin America and the Caribbean Via its Alipay+ gateway, Singapore’s Ant International announced the launch of cross-border mobile payment services in Latin America. ACI Worldwide looked at the impact of real-time payments on growth in Peru, Chile, and Argentina. Tearsheet profiled Brazilian digital financial institution Agibank. Asia-Pacific Singapore-based Crypto payments network Moonpay and controlling shareholder Seoryong Electronics announced a joint investment in Korean fintech Finger. Vietnam Bank OCB selected Backbase AI lead Chris Shayan as its Acting CEO. Visa launched Germin Pay in the Philippines. Sub-Saharan Africa African financial infrastructure company Anchor launched its Anchor MCP Server, becoming the first Nigerian fintech to make. its API documentation natively available to AI systems. The Africa Report reported on the rise of mobile money in Ghana and how it is challenging the country’s incumbent banks. Business Insider Africa looks at the fate of small business banking platform Brass which announced that it will be migrating its customers to Paystack Microfinance Bank. Central and Eastern Europe PayPal introduced a pair of Buy Now, Pay Later products for its customers in Austria. Ripple launched its RLUSD stablecoin in Turkey courtesy of partnerships with local platforms BiLira, Bitexen, and Bitlo. Equifax UK forged a partnership with Polish credit bureau BIK to boost access to identity verification and fraud prevention technology. Middle East and Northern Africa Saudi Arabia-based fintech Stitch announced a pivot to focus on infrastructure and offering a financial operating system for banks. UAE-based fintech Comfi AI secured pre-Series A funding from Yango Group’s Yango Ventures. Mastercard renews its partnership with CIB, Egypt’s largest private-sector bank. Photo by Viktor Kiryanov on Unsplash The post Finovate Global Eastern Europe: Funding Payments, Modernizing Banks, and More! appeared first on Finovate.       

Cash App launched Cash App Tags, NFC-enabled, payment “accessories” that let customers pay without their phone or card. The first of these new tags comes in the form of a wand, but the company said that other form factors will be available in the future. While payments companies have tried and failed to move the payments form factor from cards and phones, the wands may succeed because they are visible, social, and impossible to ignore. Cash App announced a new payment form factor yesterday that is so outrageous it would have dropped the jaws of payments executives in 2014 to the floor. The payments company unveiled the first release of Cash App Tags, NFC-enabled, payment “accessories” that let customers pay without their phone or card. The pilot Cash App Tag comes in the form of a pearlescent wand, aptly called Cash App Wand. Eligible users ages 13 and up with an active Cash App Card can activate their wand by linking their wand to their Cash App Card using the Cash App on their phone. Once the wand is activated, customers can tap to pay without holding a phone or card.  The new form factors will work where Visa tap-to-pay is accepted and there are no minimum balance or activity requirements. Just like Cash App’s payment cards, Tags offer real-time transaction alerts, 24/7 fraud monitoring, and the ability to instantly lock, unlock, and deactivate them within the app. Odds are that if you’re reading this, Cash App’s Tags aren’t marketed to your demographic. The company explicitly designed them for Gen Z customers as a new form of expression and for use in situations where phones aren’t allowed or are too cumbersome to pull out of a bag. Cash App is anticipating that users will want to collect them like Labubu dolls. In a recent survey of Gen Z consumers, the company found that 38% of this generation purchases collectibles, accessories, or limited edition items at least monthly. “While digital wallets are invisible and physical cards are often buried in wallets, Cash App Tags are just the opposite,” said Block Hardware Lead Thomas Templeton. “We see a unique opportunity here to make payments visible and social for the first time. Early testers have told us that they’ve loved carrying the Wand and showing it off at checkout, so we believe there’s a real appetite for this among our customers” The Cash App Wand is now available for $25 in the app, and the company plans to release limited runs of new designs in the coming weeks. “We see this as an early starting point for Cash App Tags. The number of form factors we can create is nearly limitless,” added Templeton. “From clothing to jewelry, almost any item can become a way to pay with this technology. We’re looking forward to hearing what our customers want to see next.” I can’t decide whether I love this or hate this. Payment companies have tried for over a decade to move the payment form factor from the phone to a ring, fitness band, and even a Timex watch, but each effort has failed to gain traction. At the same time, the industry has been hyper-focused on making payments invisible, and this is the exact opposite. Perhaps moving the form factor to something as outrageous as a wand will succeed because it is visible, social, and impossible to ignore. The post Cash App Experiments with New Payment Form Factors appeared first on Finovate.       

Digital financial services software company Finastra unveiled its new analytics solution for lenders this week, Data Insights 2.0. Available for Finastra’s mortgage origination solution, Originate Mortgagebot, Data Insights 2.0 gives lenders a comprehensive view of the borrower journey through the application process to identify areas of friction and applicant drop-off. Finastra was formed via a merger between Finovate alum Misys and D+H in 2017. Chris Walters is CEO. A new analytics solution offered by Finastra will help mortgage lenders convert more applications into funded loans. The new tool, Data Insights 2.0, is available for Finastra’s mortgage origination solution, Originate Mortgagebot, and gives lenders an accurate view of the borrower journey through the mortgage application process to identify where applicants tend to drop off. Data Insights 2.0 helps lenders pinpoint performance gaps to enhance their own processes, and features peer and industry benchmarking based on anonymized data from 1,000+ mortgage originators to allow them to measure their performance against the market. “We knew we were losing applicants at specific points in the process, but we couldn’t figure out why,” United Bank VP and Mortgage Production Manager Brenda Stoerkel said. “Data Insights showed us exactly where the process was breaking down. By fixing our mobile experience and adjusting our communication timing, we saw our completion rates improve. Having the right information to make better decisions makes both our operations and our borrower experience stronger.” Data Insights 2.0 offers real-time application exit point tracking as well as conversion analysis and geographic heat maps of application activity. The technology also provides insights into borrower demographic profiles, performance metrics for credit score distribution channels, and submission timing analysis. This will enable lenders to identify areas of friction in the application process better—including hard-to-understand forms, slow response times from the system, or a poor mobile experience—enabling them to accelerate approval timelines, enhance communication, and deliver a better experience for applicants. Data Insights 2.0 also provides peer benchmarking against industry standards to deliver a market-wide context for performance. These metrics—including applicant exit points, conversion rates, loan-to-value ratios, and more—enable lenders to move quickly from insight to action. “Lenders have access to a considerable amount of data, but they need real insights to help them optimize their business,” Finastra Chief Product Officer for Lending Rick Foresta said. “We built Data Insights 2.0 to cut through the noise. It tells you what’s actually happening in your mortgage pipeline and what you should do about it to make it easier for people to buy homes.” Formed via a merger between Finovate alum Misys and D+H in 2017, Finastra provides financial services software to more than 7,000 customers, including 40 of the world’s top 50 banks. Active in more than 110 countries around the world, the London-based company offers solutions for lending (LoanIQ and LaserPro), payments (Global PAYplus and Payments To Go), and universal banking (Essence), facilitating $7 trillion in transaction value daily. Photo by Álvaro Serrano on Unsplash The post Finastra Unveils New Analytics Solution for Lenders Data Insights 2.0 appeared first on Finovate.       

As financial institutions increasingly deploy AI across customer service channels, many are wondering where they should start. At FinovateSpring in San Diego earlier this year, I spoke with Cresta Director of Customer Success Stacy Osorio about how banks, credit unions, and fintechs should think about customer experience, contact center transformation, and AI-driven automation. One of the biggest opportunities, Osorio explained, is not simply using AI to reduce costs, but leveraging it to improve customer experiences while helping organizations better understand what is happening across customer interactions. “Looking at customer experience through that lens, they should be thinking about the role of AI in customer experience transforming your contact center to think about ways to use AI to drive additional revenue, helping to drive that customer experience—whether that’s driving satisfaction or helping coach and innovate different ways or more automation through your AI agent,” Osorio said when discussing how financial institutions should think about AI-powered customer experience. Osorio also noted that financial institutions should think beyond conversational AI and consider how AI can automate workflows, surface insights from customer interactions, and help human agents have better conversations. Stacy Osorio serves as Director of Customer Success at Cresta, where she works directly with enterprise customers to help them optimize customer experiences and maximize value from AI-powered customer engagement tools. Founded in 2017, Cresta offers an AI-powered contact center platform designed to help enterprises improve customer conversations, automate workflows, coach human agents, and better understand customer interactions. The company works with enterprise organizations across industries, including customers such as United Airlines, Cox, Acorns, and others. Cresta’s platform combines conversational intelligence, workflow automation, and AI agents to help organizations improve customer experiences while increasing operational efficiency. Photo by MART PRODUCTION The post How Should Financial Institutions Think About AI and Customer Experience? Cresta’s Stacy Osorio Weighs In appeared first on Finovate.       

Ramp raised $750 million at a $44 billion valuation as it expands beyond corporate cards and expense management. The company is betting AI token spend will become a major business cost category requiring new financial infrastructure. Ramp launched Stack, an AI-native accounting platform, as it pushes deeper into automation, accounting, and enterprise finance. Corporate card and expense management platform Ramp is on a roll this week. In addition to launching Stack, an AI-native platform for accountants, the New York-based company also raised $750 million at a $44 billion valuation. The $750 million boosts the company’s total funds to $3.75 billion, following its most recent raise of $300 million in November of last year. Investors in this week’s round include new contributors Goldman Sachs Alternatives, D.E. Shaw & Co., Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Generation Investment Management, Insight Partners, and BroadLight Capital, as well as previous investors Founders Fund, Lightspeed Venture Partners, D1 Capital Partners, T. Rowe Price, General Catalyst, Alpha Wave Global, 137 Ventures, Thrive Capital, Coatue, Sands Capital, Khosla Ventures, 1789 Capital, Avenir Growth, BoxGroup, 8VC, Pinegrove Venture Partners, Definition Capital, and Stripes. The investment comes as Ramp positions itself as financial infrastructure for AI spending by expanding into managing one of the fastest-growing costs in business: tokens. “For 500 years, business ran on two pillars of spend: people and vendors. In the last 24 months, a third arrived—intelligence, paid by the token and invisible to every system we’ve built to manage cost. Ramp is the infrastructure for the third pillar,” said Ramp Co-Founder and CEO Eric Glyman. As businesses embed AI into workflows, employees and agents are generating growing volumes of token-based costs across models, copilots, and automated workflows. Ramp is betting companies will increasingly need tools to monitor, control, and optimize those costs just as they do traditional employee and vendor spending. The round also comes days after Ramp launched Stack, a tool that allows customers to use agents to do reconciliations, update schedules, post journal entries, and create flux analyses. This creates value for accountants, as it has pre-built integrations that connect to every system their clients use, offers a full audit trail on every action, and provides an underlying model that handles a wide range of accounting tasks. Some analysts claim that Ramp is overvalued at $44 billion, as it well exceeds competitor Brex’s valuation of $5.15 billion when it was acquired by Capital One earlier this year. It also exceeds PayPal’s valuation of nearly $38 billion. However, Ramp is defending its value based on its past platform growth and current trajectory. In the past few months alone, Ramp has launched more than 70 products and major features. In addition to token spend management and Stack, the company released budget tools, procurement agents, accounting agents, and customized tools for startups. Also, Ramp closed two acquisitions and announced geographical expansions into the UK and Europe. “We’re growing as fast as we were three years ago, at roughly twenty times the size,” said Glyman. “And that’s because finance is going through the biggest structural change since the spreadsheet. Every company needs infrastructure to navigate an AI economy, from a CFO in London to an accounting firm in Wichita. While we’re growing fast, we still only serve a fraction of the market. There’s a lot more work to do.” Whether Ramp’s valuation proves justified remains to be seen. But the company’s recent product launches and messaging suggest it is attempting something larger than expense management. Rather than positioning itself as a corporate card company, Ramp is betting that businesses entering an AI economy will need new financial infrastructure to manage not only employees and vendors, but also increasingly autonomous systems and the costs they generate. The post Ramp Raises $750 Million at a $44 Billion Valuation appeared first on Finovate.       

The recent crisis involving Bilt, a fintech that specializes in rent-payment rewards, is almost a perfect storm of the challenges faced by fintechs, banks, regulators, and their customers when it comes to third-party partnerships and their discontents. This week, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) reported that it had met with Bilt to discuss the issues surrounding the flawed transition process when its partnership with Wells Fargo ended in February of this year. The two companies had been working together since 2022 to offer the Bilt Mastercard. When the partnership ended, Bilt struggled to efficiently move customers into its new Bilt 2.0 structure. Customer complaints were rampant: rent and mortgage payments were returned, delayed, or debited without reaching intended recipients. Card declines were reported amid general confusion about the new arrangement. Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, who took an early interest in the problem, said that there had been a 1,300% spike in CFPB complaints due to the problems of the Bilt transition. The CFPB’s statement today expresses confidence in the steps Bilt is taking to remedy the situation, including “reimbursing fees for more than 500 newly identified customers from its outreach following discussions with the CFPB.” The agency also noted that it would “continue monitoring Bilt’s efforts until it is satisfied that full redress will be provided and will share another update at such time.” What are some of the biggest takeaways from Bilt’s breakup with Wells Fargo and its complaint-ridden transition process? Partnerships are hard, breaking up can be harder For all the understandable concern about making fintech/bank partnerships work, there is relatively little discussion about what fintechs should do—or need to do—when a partnership is ending to ensure that the transition does not negatively impact customers or damage relationships with other partners. Arguably, this is the biggest single takeaway from the Bilt breakup and transition: whether it is because of a regulatory decision, a business challenge, or a bank failure, when transitions out of these partnerships go poorly, the negative impacts tend to fall disproportionately on consumers. There is also some question about who bears the responsibility of protecting customer data and funds during transitions. As such, when these events occur, they can have an industry-wide impact on consumer trust toward fintechs and can blunt innovation by making new technologies and services seem risky to end users and potential partners. The human touch helps in a crisis Even though there were reportedly issues with customers accessing live customer support due to “high volumes,” the fact that many Bilt customers were steered toward AI chatbots to resolve issues was a operational and, potentially reputational, mistake. On the operational level, many customers reported that AI chatbots were unable to answer their questions or provide basic information, let alone resolve specific complaints. Reputationally, this can leave an impression that a firm does not care about effectively triaging customer problems, even if it is understandably not able to solve some problems immediately. This is also a reminder that human agents that can respond with authentic empathy to confused and frustrated customers are still valuable at a time of increasingly agentic customer care. Regulatory clarity requires regulatory authority The lack of regulatory clarity about the ultimate responsibility for safeguarding consumer data and capital during transitions like the one involving Bilt and Wells Fargo is a real problem. But this lack of clarity is compounded when the disposition of the regulatory body itself is difficult to discern. In its statement, the CFPB underscored its preference for a “collaborative process” rather than what is called a “protracted investigation, followed by a public enforcement action, which could be litigated for years before consumers get any redress.” This, plus a swipe at the Biden-era CFPB director Rohit Chopra, suggests that the CFPB prefers to pursue a less confrontational approach when it comes to holding companies accountable when their actions harm consumers. This is perhaps better than no approach at all. Recall that the Trump Administration in February 2025 launched a near-shutdown of the CFPB, stopping all enforcement actions, halting new and ongoing investigations, and even locking staff out of buildings. Many of the administration’s actions have been put on hold by a federal court judge ruling in 2025, and oral arguments on a lawsuit challenging the administration’s actions against the CFPB were heard this February. In the meantime, a slimmed-down CFPB has changed its mission to focus on what it calls issues of “clear consumer harm, particularly fraud affecting servicemembers and veterans.” How well this approach will serve the consumers harmed by the next failed fintech/bank partnership remains to be seen. Photo by Javier Allegue Barros on Unsplash The post 3 Takeaways from Bilt’s Breakup and Troubled Transition from Wells Fargo appeared first on Finovate.       

Digital banking provider Bankjoy announced that its personal finance platform JoyCompass is now deployed with 30 community financial institutions. Embedded directly into users’ digital banking experience, JoyCompass is designed to help boost financial wellness while giving community financial institutions valuable data to help them deepen client engagement. Bankjoy made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2016 and most recently demoed its technology at FinovateFall 2023. Michael Duncan is Founder and CEO. A year after digital banking provider Bankjoy introduced its next-generation personal finance platform, JoyCompass, the solution continues to see broad adoption by community banks and credit unions. Designed to help community financial institutions (CFIs) boost growth via client engagement, JoyCompass is embedded into users’ digital banking experience, supporting financial wellness while providing CFIs with data that helps them increase client engagement and total relationship value. Today, Bankjoy announced that a total of 30 CFIs are now using the platform, including Ellafi, CommunityWide, Advantage Plus, Statewide, Lewis Clark, OU FCU, and SIU CU, among others. “Community financial institutions have a unique opportunity to differentiate themselves through digital banking experiences that are personal, proactive, and impactful. JoyCompass is helping our clients do exactly that,” Bankjoy Co-Founder and CEO Michael Duncan said. Bankjoy noted that members using JoyCompass’ spending analysis functionality experienced retention gains of nearly 10% (93% vs 83.8%). Members who created a goal using JoyCompass saw retention gains of nearly 15% (98.5% vs 83.8%), and members who created a budget using JoyCompass experienced retention gains of more than 16% (100% vs 83.8%). These statistics, the company noted, mean deeper relationships with members and reduced churn. “We were looking for different ways to help our members manage their finances,” said Dillon Tardiff, VP of Marketing and Digital Products at Ellafi Credit Union. “Having JoyCompass within our digital banking, powered by our own data, is just phenomenal. Having it right there is so easy, it helps members track goals and make progress on whatever matters most, whether paying off debt, saving for maternity leave, or other life events.” Bankjoy’s offering comes as financial literacy continues to be a problem for many consumers. According to a report from Accenture, 40% of customers admit to lacking basic financial knowledge, with 88% of Gen Z and Millennial consumers saying they would like to expand their financial literacy. Additionally, 72% of customers value personalization in their banking options even as many community financial institutions remain unable to offer highly-personalized experiences. In response to this, Bankjoy’s JoyCompass offers a comprehensive financial wellness platform that features personalized education tools, a financial health scoring system, and gamification strategies to make challenging financial concepts and ideas easier to understand. “JoyCompass enables growth by delivering on the original mission that made community banking special through the branch, now accomplished digitally: building meaningful, personal relationships and helping people succeed financially,” Duncan said when the solution was launched in May 2025. “JoyCompass solves the engagement challenge through gamified financial wellness tools that members actually want to use, delivering value for users and critical data for financial institutions. It creates a virtuous cycle that benefits both the client and the institution.” Bankjoy made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2016 and most recently demoed its technology at FinovateFall 2023, where it showed how its platform is helping neobank Panacea Financial deliver financial services for medical professionals. Founded in 2015 and headquartered in Royal Oak, Michigan, Bankjoy also recently announced that four Corelation-core credit unions have renewed their partnerships with the fintech over the past three months. Bankjoy was recognized as the first Corelation Certified partner in 2021. Photo by Nils Huenerfuerst on Unsplash The post Bankjoy Announces Broad Adoption of Personal Finance Platform JoyCompass appeared first on Finovate.       

Financial crime innovator AMLYZE announced this week that fellow Lithuanian company WALLETTO has selected it to strengthen its anti-money laundering (AML) and counter-financial terrorism (CFT) capabilities. AMLYZE was founded in 2019 to help fight financial crime with a range of SaaS-based products that cover real-time and retrospective transaction monitoring, customer risk assessment, AML/CFT investigations, sanctions, PEP, and adverse media screening. WALLETTO will integrate AMLYZE’s AML/CFT platform to help reinforce its compliance framework. WALLETTO will leverage the full AMLYZE product suite, including Transaction Monitoring, Customer Risk Assessment, AML Investigations, Customer Screening, and Payment Screening. “At WALLETTO, maintaining the highest standards of compliance, security, and operational resilience is a fundamental part of our long-term growth strategy,” said WALLETTO Member of the Management Board Migle Soltysiak. WALLETTO was founded in 2017 to offer solutions for card issuance, acquiring, and electronic payments such as SEPA and SWIFT services. The company is an e-money institution (EMI) regulated by the Bank of Lithuania and holds partnerships with Visa and Mastercard to help businesses scale their payments services without having to worry about compliance. For AMLYZE, which demoed at FinovateEurope 2024, partnering with WALLETTO will help it expand into the Baltic region. “Welcoming WALLETTO to our client portfolio is a particularly meaningful milestone for us,” said AMLYZE CEO and Co-Founder Gabrielius Erikas Bilkštys. “WALLETTO is one of the largest fintechs in Lithuania, and this partnership reflects our commitment to the Baltic market, which we consider our home. We are proud to be the compliance partner of choice for leading institutions in this region and to continue growing our portfolio of clients served here.” The partnership comes as compliance infrastructure is becoming not only a regulatory requirement but also a competitive differentiator. As fintechs expand internationally, launch additional payment capabilities, and face more regulatory scrutiny, demand is growing for specialized platforms capable of managing complex financial crime workflows. For AMLYZE, landing one of Lithuania’s largest fintechs shows that newer compliance providers can increasingly compete for traditional financial institutions rather than only smaller customers. Photo by Pixabay The post WALLETTO Taps AMLYZE to Advance AML Compliance appeared first on Finovate.       

Concentrix Corporation and Napier AI are teaming up to help companies enhance their anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing operations. Integrating Napier AI’s compliance platform into Concentrix’s network of financial crime capabilities will enable businesses to boost their fraud prevention efforts with banking-grade, AI-powered solutions. Napier AI made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2018. The London-based financial crime prevention specialist was founded in 2015. Greg Watson is CEO. A new collaboration between Concentrix Corporation and financial crime specialist Napier AI will deliver advanced, AI-powered anti-money laundering (AML) solutions to companies in banking and financial services, as well as Tranche 2-impacted firms across Australia and New Zealand. The collaboration adds Napier AI’s compliance platform to Concentrix’s network of financial crime and regulatory technology capabilities, leveraging intelligent transformation, data, and operational excellence to enable companies to transform their fraud prevention and financial crime operations with banking-grade, AI-powered AML and sanctions screening capabilities. The partnership will help companies detect and stop financial crime with greater accuracy and speed, reduce the risk of false negatives, lower the number and frequency of false positives, use automation and intelligent workflows to streamline compliance processes, and enhance regulatory reporting and audit readiness. “Nobody should have to choose between effective compliance and business growth,” Napier AI Head of Asia Pacific Ron Mullins said. “By partnering with Concentrix, we’re combining cutting-edge AI technology with global scale and transformation expertise to help organizations across ANZ rethink how they approach financial crime—making compliance smarter, faster, and more trusted.” Designed for banks and credit unions, the collaboration will also benefit Tranche 2-impacted firms such as real estate agents, accountants, legal practitioners, and other professional service providers. These entities are expected to be subject to AML and counter-terrorist financing (CTF) regulations once Tranche 2 of Australia’s Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing (AML/CTF) reforms is fully implemented. Tranche 1 of the framework, which focuses on traditional financial institutions like banks, credit unions, and money transfer services, was implemented in 2006. “Financial crime compliance is at a pivotal moment in ANZ, where institutions must balance increasing regulatory demands with the need to deliver seamless customer experiences,” Concentrix GVP of Growth for ANZ Dhiraj Kumar said. “Our collaboration with Napier AI enhances our broader ecosystem of capabilities, strengthening our ability to deliver intelligent, tech-powered solutions that help clients stay ahead of financial crime while driving operational efficiency and innovation.” A global technology company, Concentrix Corporation helps more than 2,000 clients solve business challenges via a combination of unique data and insights, deep industry expertise, and advanced technology solutions. An intelligent transformation partner and member of the Fortune 500, Concentrix serves companies in verticals ranging from banking and financial services to healthcare, e-commerce, energy, transportation, and more. The firm recently unveiled its immersive experience center, iX360: a hands-on environment that gives clients the opportunity to see technology in action and understand how it supports customer and operational needs. Napier AI made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2018. At the conference, the company demonstrated its customer screening and transaction monitoring enhancement software, which boosts the performance of legacy AML and client screening solutions. The company’s flagship solution, the Napier AI Continuum platform, integrates multiple compliance solutions into a single dashboard and provides cloud-native, API-first architecture to ensure low-latency performance without disruption during transaction spikes. Founded in 2015, Napier AI today is trusted by more than 100 institutions around the world, with clients including Banco do Brasil, NVIDIA, and State Street. Greg Watson is CEO. Photo by Anthony DELANOIX on Unsplash The post Napier AI Teams Up with Concentrix to Boost AML Compliance appeared first on Finovate.       

The conversation continues on the Finovate Podcast with Finovate VP and Director of Fintech Strategy, Informa Festivals, Greg Palmer! Ahead of the release of the Finovate Podcast Best of Show interview series from FinovateSpring, catch up with episodes from earlier in the year that you might have missed. From AI in banking and consumer finance to digital payments and the challenges facing small businesses, Greg Palmer and the Finovate Podcast cover the top issues in fintech today, as well as underdiscussed topics like financial literacy and the fate of cannabis banking. Check out the latest from Greg Palmer and the Finovate Podcast below. Finovate Podcast host Greg Palmer talks with Melissa Solis, CEO of Inbenta, on the evolving role of artificial intelligence in the banking and financial services industry. Solis introduces her four-stage approach to successful AI implementation and management for banks looking to build on their existing systems. Solis also discusses the customer-facing side of AI, sharing her thoughts on best practices for virtual assistants, live agent support, and enterprise search tools. Episode 294—Melissa Solis, Inbenta Stacy Litke, VP of Banking Services at Green Check, and Megan Bennett, Manager of Marijuana Related Business at Wright-Patt Credit Union, talk with podcast host Greg Palmer about the challenges and opportunities involved in providing banking and financial services to businesses in the cannabis industry. Green Check is a Florida-based provider of software solutions for financial and business services in this industry. Wright-Patt Credit Union is Ohio’s largest, member-owned credit union, and one of the 50 largest credit unions in the US. Episode 293—Stacy Litke, Green Check, and Megan Bennett, Wright-Patt Credit Union How are financial services companies leveraging enabling technologies like AI to empower consumers? Podcast host Greg Palmer interviews Debbie Hsu, EVP of Product at Experian, to talk about solutions such as Experian’s virtual assistant, EVA. A consumer-based AI-powered solution that simplifies complex financial questions and provides actionable guidance, EVA is an example of the value that finance-specific AI tools—built on trusted data and domain expertise—provide compared to generic AI solutions that can generate misleading or incomplete advice. Episode 292—Debbie Hsu, Experian Podcast host Greg Palmer talks with Luz Urrutia, CEO of the Accion Opportunity Fund (AOF), about the current state of small businesses in the US and the challenges they face when it comes to securing access to capital. Accion Opportunity Fund is a nationwide provider of affordable loans, educational resources, coaching, and networking for underserved small businesses. Headquartered in San Jose, California, AOF has served more than 4.5 million clients across lending and learning, and invested more than $1 billion in small businesses since inception in 1993. Episode 291—Luz Urrutia, Accion Opportunity Fund Robert Bueninck, CEO of Unzer, talks with podcast host Greg Palmer about the challenges facing small and medium-sized businesses in the digital payments industry. Unzer is a German fintech, headquartered in Berlin, that offers a unified commerce suite for businesses that enables them to integrate online, in-store, and mobile paymentsƒ into a single ecosystem. In their conversation, Bueninck and Palmer discuss the unique characteristics of the German market, including the fact that cash still dominates many retail transactions. Episode 290—Robert Bueninck, Unzer Photo by Amr Taha on Unsplash The post Finovate Podcast Talks AI, Payments, Cannabis Banking and More! appeared first on Finovate.