This week I had the pleasure of seeing many of you in Las Vegas at Fintech Meetup, where I was moderating the cross-border payments panel ‘How Fintech is Transforming Global Payments’. The event was a strong reflection of the opportunities in the sector, with business development high on the agenda for most attendees, as well as some strong panels from across the industry.

Joining me (far left) onstage were (from left to right in the picture above) Debopama Sen, Head, Global Payments, at Citi; Matt Oppenheimer, Co-Founder & CEO of Remitly; Laetitia Moncarz, Global Head of Payments at Papaya Global; and Ryan Frere, EVP & GM of B2B at Flywire. Together we discussed the role that fintechs are playing in driving the development and innovation of cross-border payments infrastructure. Key points covered included:

• Innovation in the sector has often started on the consumer side (think speed, transparency, accessibility) and is now being rolled out to business customers, with their much more complex needs. 
• Fintechs have played a significant role in disrupting legacy payments systems, particularly through P2P platforms (such as Remitly), alternative payment methods and the use of APIs, as well as their role in driving the development and adoption of real-time payments systems.
• The sector is powered by cross-industry partnerships, especially between the global banks such as Citi and the fintechs. Each supports the other to enable innovation in the sector. 
• Emerging markets have been outgrowing the pace of the sector (see our market size data), with central banks and regulators transforming their markets in countries such as Brazil and India. 
• As the sector has evolved, innovation across many specialist use-cases have emerged, whether it is within education and receivables (Flywire) or making global payroll payments without the need for local bank accounts (Papaya Global). 
• The role that technology, in particular AI, is playing in supporting this change, whether through better risk management or automation of customer service.
• There is still a long way to go in terms of innovation opportunity in the sector. More use cases emerge every day and with computing power scaling exponentially, what was not possible or even thought of yesterday becomes a new development today.

Missed me at Fintech Meetup? Get in touch to discuss how we can help

Daniel Webber

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Daniel is Founder and CEO at FXC Intelligence. Daniel is a leading influencer in the global payments space internationally. He is frequently invited to speak at industry conferences and provide insights and data on the sector. Daniel is widely quoted across the sector including in The Economist, Wall Street Journal, Reuters and Daniel is also a contributor for Forbes.com. FXC Intelligence's weekly industry newsletter is the most widely read in the international payments market.