Author: Annette Rowena

Buying Bitcoin in Singapore takes minutes. Doing it without handing your money to the wrong platform? Now that takes a little more care. The safest route for everyday investors is through a licensed Digital Payment Token provider, as these providers fall under the purview of the Monetary Authority of Singapore and hold a Major Payment Institution licence. With these providers, your money is placed inside a rigorous regulatory framework. Licensed platforms have to follow strict anti-money laundering rules, defend their systems against attack, and keep customer funds separate. Now, how do you buy your Bitcoin and keep it securely? Last…

The 2026 FIFA World Cup is barely underway, and crypto scammers have already built the infrastructure to steal from fans in relation to World Cup crypto scams. Blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs has identified four cryptocurrency addresses tied to three live scam operations targeting football supporters. These include two fake-ticketing sites as well as one fixed-match betting pitch, all of which are reported to Chainabuse. Ari Redbord, Global Head of Policy at TRM Labs, explained that criminals have a tendency to exploit major events and cultural moments, and don’t wait for kickoffs. He added, “Scammers build and position their infrastructure…

Australia’s virtual asset sector is running out of time to meet incoming compliance requirements. From 1 July 2026, the AUSTRAC Tranche 2 reforms extend Australia’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing compliance requirements to a wider range of virtual asset services. This includes replacing the concept of “digital currency” with a broader “virtual asset” definition, defined under the AML/CTF Amendment Act 2024. The reforms will very soon apply to crypto-to-crypto exchanges, custodial wallet services, virtual asset transfers, and related financial services. Affected virtual asset service providers, therefore, have weeks to meet the obligations that come with the change, if they haven’t…

Behind the glow of a Telegram chat window, a victim lured by a fake job offer and trafficked into a Southeast Asian scam compound is coerced under violence, running romance scams against strangers half a world away. The wallet collecting the proceeds lies on a public blockchain, and this is just one of the many Southeast Asia crypto scams happening today. This is also one of the uncomfortable intersections Chainalysis maps out in its 2026 Crypto Crime Report. Its data indicates that cryptocurrency flows to suspected human trafficking services reached hundreds of millions of dollars in 2025, an 85% YoY…

Payment processes have always operated according to rules set in advance, with someone accountable when things go wrong, and the same instruction producing the same outcome every time. This was precisely the promise that kept trillions of dollars moving across card networks, real-time settlement systems and every other rail. It is also what autonomous AI agents are now starting to test. Agentic AI payment systems, rather than executing instructions a human has already approved, reason, plan, and initiate transactions on their own at machine speed, possibly even with limited human intervention at each step. Technology giants and fintech startups alike…

Tazapay is putting US$36 million behind agentic payments and cross-border stablecoin rails, betting that AI agents will soon be paying for software by transaction. The Singapore-based payments company closed a Series B extension led by Circle Ventures, with Coinbase Ventures and CMT Digital joining as new backers, taking its total Series B to US$36 million. The fresh capital is earmarked for licensing, corridor expansion across Asia, Latin America, the Americas, and the Middle East, and infrastructure for AI-driven payments. In an interview with Fintech News Network’s Chief Editor Vincent Fong, Chief Product Officer Aayush Singhania unpacks how Tazapay onboards customers…

Would you let a piece of software shop for you? From browsing for options, weighing the price, and clicking buy without checking with you first? In Singapore, a sizeable share of consumers are open to the idea of agentic commerce, recent research shows. But where does the principle of trust stand in all of this? AI Agents May Have an Easier Sell in Singapore Than Elsewhere Nearly half of Singapore’s consumers would allow an AI agent to browse and buy on their behalf, according to agentic commerce research from Worldpay, now Global Payments. A further 41% say they are open…

Back in 2019, GoTyme (or TymeBank as it was known then) was a single South African digital bank trying to prove that a self-service kiosk could open accounts faster than a branch. Fast forward to today, and it has now expanded to serve 20+ million customers across South Africa and the Philippines. The digital bank has also earned the kind of validation most digital banks still chase after. Now, Tyme Group’s scorecard is impressive. A US$250 million Series D funding round led by Nubank in December 2024 minted Tyme as a unicorn. A year later, TIME magazine named the group…

What does the digital assets market look like to someone who’s seen money move from within some of the world’s largest traditional financial institutions and from one of crypto’s most recognised infrastructure companies? For Kirit Bhatia, Chief Digital Assets Officer at Banking Circle, this is the unique vantage point he brings into his role. Before joining Banking Circle in late 2025, Bhatia spent years across JPMorgan Chase, RBS, and Ripple, moving between the old and new worlds of financial infrastructure. He’s now applying that experience at Banking Circle, a fully licensed bank with central bank clearing rails that processes EUR1+…

For decades, the world’s financial system has been running on a robust yet highly intricate infrastructure. Payment rails, settlement systems, regulatory and governance frameworks, and trading infrastructure are all moving parts of the same grid. Together, they enable financial value to move, be held, and be settled across borders, institutions and asset classes. A new layer is now being integrated into that grid by banks and non-banks alike for digital assets. Crucially, as McKinsey notes in its A New Era of Fintech report, “the (digital) assets gaining most attention are those that behave, monetise, and integrate like financial infrastructure.” Against…

Grab Q1 2026 results showed accelerating momentum across its lending business, as the company’s financial services arm disbursed more than $1 billion in loans in a single quarter for the first time. Alex Hungate, Grab’s President and COO, shared on LinkedIn that this has been a strong quarter financially in an otherwise “usually seasonally quieter period.” Grab now has 52 million monthly transacting users, up both YoY and QoQ. He explained more about Grab’s financial services performance, saying, “The power of AI is reshaping Financial Services. AI underwriting is unlocking formal credit to more driver- and merchant-partners, responsibly. We were…

When Dwaipayan Sadhu spoke to Fintech News Singapore last year, the Trust Bank CEO shared that the bank was actively working towards profitability. That target has now materialised. Trust Bank hit profitability in Singapore for the first time in March 2026, just over three years after its launch in September 2022, becoming the first of Singapore’s five digital banks to announce the milestone. But the more important story is how it got there. Backed by Standard Chartered and FairPrice Group, Trust Bank credits the milestone to three drivers: stronger customer engagement, a broader product suite, and greater operating efficiency through…

Stablecoin is having its moment, or as described by some, a “stablecoin summer”. On-chain transactions have climbed from US$27.6 trillion to US$33 trillion. In Singapore alone, US$150 million flowed into four stablecoin startups in a single month. And on 10 April 2026, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority handed its first two stablecoin issuer licences to HSBC and a Standard Chartered-led joint venture, Anchorpoint Financial. With so many developments happening in tandem, there’s a lot to discuss about what these developments mean to the industry. This set the tone for “Why Stablecoins May Become The Backbone of 24/7 Global Trade”, a…

Over the past few years, Pakistan’s digital banking sector has been developing slowly but surely. Back in 2023, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) approved five digital retail banks, issuing no-objection certificates to HugoBank, KT Bank Pakistan (now Buraq Bank), Mashreq Bank Pakistan, Raqqami Islamic Digital Bank, and Telenor Microfinance Bank. Since then, based on the list of SBP-regulated entities, three digital banks in Pakistan are now in operation: Easypaisa Bank Limited, Mashreq Bank Pakistan Limited, and Raqami Islamic Digital Bank Limited. For consumers searching for the best digital bank in Pakistan, their pick depends on whether they prioritise breadth…

We often group the Southeast Asian region under one label when talking about the countries casually: SEAblings. But each country has its own unique identity, which transcends to how each market uses its respective payment methods, shaped by factors like dominant payment methods, relationship with cash, homegrown champions, and regulatory philosophy. Understanding those differences across markets is the best way to see how payments work in Southeast Asia. Right now, Asia Pacific, and by that extension, Southeast Asia, is where the most interesting payment method developments are taking place. From the warungs in Indonesia to street vendors in Bangkok and…

We’re living in a time when convenience is moving as quickly as you can blink, including all things payments, thanks to the gift of AI. Yet the very same technology is fuelling something far more sinister and constantly proving harder to tackle: fraud. Fraud numbers are growing exponentially. According to Juniper Research, eCommerce fraud could rise from $56 billion in 2025 to hit highs of $131 billion in 2030, with factors like friendly fraud carving deeply into merchant margins. Visa paints an equally alarming picture. Today’s cyber criminals are arriving armed with AI-powered deepfakes, synthetic identities, and agentic scams that…

For decades, accepting card payments meant investing in dedicated hardware, like a separate terminal for every checkout point. Each tech evolution, from early card terminals to modern POS systems, often came with its own set of requirements and processes. Today, the landscape of in-person commerce is spinning on its axis. Businesses are moving away from traditional and stationary checkout counters, driven by the need for greater agility and the flexibility to meet evolving customer expectations. Mobile POS solutions are a strategic response to this, bringing payments closer to the customer, shortening the sales cycle, and delivering a faster and seamless…

FIs (financial institutions) are typically considered to be accountable for the behaviour of AI that they use, irrespective of whether it was built or procured. -Mindforge AI Risk Management: Operationalisation Handbook Somewhere in an institution’s software stack, there might just be an AI model running on an update they did not approve. Think about the patch to your AI product that was rolled out automatically last quarter. Without you knowing, it may be posing cybersecurity, technology and possibly even reputational risks. Yet the contract with your vendor says nothing specific about it. This challenge is one of the core things…

The fintech sector continues to be one of the most dynamic forces reshaping financial services across Asia-Pacific. This ranking, drawn from the FT-Statista High-Growth Companies Asia-Pacific 2026 list, spotlights the region’s fastest-growing fintech companies based on revenue growth between 2021 and 2024. From digital banks and payment infrastructure to insurtech and wealth management platforms, these companies reflect the breadth and ambition of Asian fintech innovation. Singapore leads the fintech pack with 12 entrants, followed by India with 11, underscoring both markets’ reputations as regional fintech powerhouses. Standout performers include Singapore’s Aspire (1772%) and Storepay (1722%), Indonesia’s DurianPay (1626%), and Malaysia’s…

More than 3.4 billion digital wallets are already in use worldwide, powering close to $9 trillion in annual payments. By 2026, digital wallet adoption is expected to rise to 5.4 billion users, cementing e-wallets as one of the most dominant financial tools on the planet. Yet, despite these transaction volume surges, margins remain as thin as ever. Payment processing has become a scale game, with high-volume, low-yield written all over it. How do banks, fintechs, and payment providers turn these high-volume, low-margin transactions into sustainable profit? Is there a way to effectively move beyond transactions and build ecosystems that drive…