Europe

ACCEPTANCE & PROCESSING

Episode Six and Fireblocks have co‑developed a unified payments solution merging traditional ledgering with digital‑asset custody and settlement rails. This joint initiative targets issuers, acquirers, and processors that want to add token‑based payouts, loyalty, or treasury use‑cases without rewriting their existing merchant acceptance integrations. For enterprise PSPs, the architecture promises faster time‑to‑market for new rails while preserving PCI‑scoped card acceptance and ISO 20022 reporting.

CROSS-BORDER

Bank of England has announced a new collaboration with the Monetary Authority of Singapore and the Bank of Thailand to explore the implications of settling FX transactions using synchronised settlement mechanisms. Through this collaboration, the central banks are fostering a shared commitment to the development of financial infrastructure arrangements to enhance payments acceptance through cross-border interoperability of tokenised transactions.

DIGITAL, RETAIL & ‘NEO’ BANKING

JPMorgan and DBS have begun work on an interoperability framework to move tokenised deposits across heterogeneous blockchain networks. JPMorgan’s Kinexys unit frames the trials as a path to on‑chain, bank‑backed settlement between institutions, with early tests involving Mastercard and Coinbase. For corporate payables and marketplaces, interoperable deposit tokens could compress settlement windows and reduce correspondent friction behind the scenes of acceptance flows.

MOBILE MONEY/WALLETS

BLIK is piloting cross-border euro transfers via phone numbers, beginning with a transaction from Portugal’s MB WAY to a BLIK user in Poland. The project is part of EuroPA’s interoperability efforts, which include systems Bizum, Bancomat Pay and Vipps MobilePay. Altogether, this could provide secure and efficient mobile transfers to over 450 million Europeans. During the first phase of the pilot, BLIK users will be able to receive transfers from ewallets, with increased capabilities to make outward transfers to be rolled out gradually.

Rest of the World

ACCEPTANCE & PROCESSING

T2 Systems has integrated ID TECH’s validated PCI P2PE into its Parking Access and Revenue Control System (PARCS), adding hardware‑based encryption for contactless, chip, and magstripe payments in lanes. This reduces fraud exposure on a high‑velocity acceptance use‑case, specifically for card schemes and acquirers. The move reflects a broader pattern of innovation, from introducing retail-grade encryption to tokenisation, to adapt to consumer Tap-to-Pay behaviour in the mobility and transit space.

CRYPTOASSETS/BLOCKCHAIN/DLT

Nium has joined Visa’s stablecoin settlement pilot to support cross‑border payouts over stablecoin rails, positioning its network for programmable treasury and faster creator/contractor disbursements. The move follows Nium’s broader real‑time payout expansion, with the firm also announcing a Digit9 partnership focussed on full‑value GCC payouts.

SCHEMES

Visa has introduced a “Trusted Agent Protocol” to their Intelligent Commerce suite, to help merchants recognise approved AI agents and block malicious automation during agent‑driven shopping and checkout, thereby furthering payments acceptance from AI-initiated transactions. The framework seeks to build confidence in the agentic ecosystem by adding agent‑specific cryptographic signals, plugging into Visa’s Intelligent Commerce stack to preserve merchant visibility, and reducing false positives from bot‑mitigation tools. The wider Intelligence Commerce suite is set to pilot across the APAC region by early 2026.