Fintech Daily Digest

Thunes published a comprehensive Complete Guide to Mobile Wallets 2025, the second edition of an extensive study that dives into the acceleration of mobile wallet adoption and the evolution of digital payments. It highlights one of the most dramatic shifts in the payments market: mobile wallets are quickly establishing themselves as the new standard. In Southeast Asia and Africa, the rapid adoption of mobile payments is enabling these regions to leapfrog traditional payment methods, moving directly from cash reliance to a fully digital ecosystem. Even in markets historically dominated by card transactions, mobile wallet adoption is rising sharply, signaling a global trend towards more agile, digital-first payment solutions.

"Mastercard is advancing the future of payments, finance and technology with new, global end-to-end stablecoin acceptance and payments capabilities, to ensure that people and businesses can make and receive stablecoin payments - anytime, anywhere. While banks and fintechs are increasingly engaging with solutions built on stablecoins, global ubiquity and scale is contingent on everyday utility, seamless integration into existing financial systems, and an intuitive user experience. To allow consumers and businesses to use stablecoins as easily as the money in their bank accounts, Mastercard is providing an integrated, 360-degree approach..."

"Last year Stripe spent $1.1 billion acquiring Bridge, the company that provides cross border API infrastructure for stablecoin payments. On April 25, 2025 a member of Stripe's crypto product team, Jennifer Lee, announced on X that the company is starting to test its Bridge-based product and invited companies outside the US, UK and EU who want to access dollars. She didn't mention which stablecoins solutions would be offered initially."

Unlike the other U.S. banking regulators, the Fed did not roll back its guidance that blocks banks from engaging directly with crypto-assets. This creates operational challenges for banks looking to offer crypto custody services, particularly around covering gas fees for on-chain transactions - a standard practice for crypto custodians but restricted under guidance that was left in place. The Fed also continues to prohibit banks from issuing stablecoins on permissionless blockchains, while the other regulatory agencies rolled that back. https://x.com/CaitlinLong_/status/1916570716880933266

The U.S. Federal Reserve Board (FRB) rescinded its 2022 supervisory letter establishing an expectation that the banks it regulates and supervises provide advance notification of planned or current crypto-asset activities. As a result, the FRB will no longer expect banks to provide notification and will instead monitor banks' crypto-asset activities through the normal supervisory process. The FRB is also rescinding its 2023 supervisory letter regarding the supervisory nonobjection process for bank engagement in dollar token activities.

At a briefing held at the Bank of Korea on April 21, 2025, Deputy Governor Lee Jong-ryul reportedly pointed out that the "Project Hangang River" three-month pilot that started on April 1, 2025, is more about experimenting with "deposit tokens," a stablecoin issued by domestic commercial banks, than the central bank digital currency (CBDC) issued by the Bank of Korea. As of April 20, 51,766 electronic wallets capable of using deposit tokens had been opened, and a cumulative total of 29,251 transactions had occurred from April 1 to April 20.

Nigeria will reportedly sign a deal to enable a direct conversion of naira to digital renminbi (RMB) according to Nigeria-China Strategic Partnership (NCSP) Director-General Joseph Tegbehas. Speaking at a conference in Lagos, he said the agreement could reduce Nigeria's dependence on the United States dollar. The NCSP jointly established ivy the Chinese and Nigerian governments in November 2024 under the leadership of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu following agreements reached with President Xi Jinping at FOCAC 2024, aiming to deepen economic, trade, and investment relations between the two nations. It serves facilitate high-impact partnerships that align with Nigeria's development priorities and China's Belt and Road Initiative. But there has not yet been an announcement on the NCSP website regarding the RMB deal. https://ncsp.gov.ng

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) published the results of the Project Meridian FX experiment that demonstrated the atomic settlement of FX transactions between different wholesale payment infrastructures across jurisdictions, and between an RTGS system and a DLT platform. Using an emulated UK real-time gross settlement (RTGS) system, the project connected to three experimental interoperability solutions from the Eurosystem: DL3S (developed by the Bank of France), TIPS Hash-Link (developed by the Bank of Italy) and the Trigger Solution (developed by the Deutsche Bundesbank). In each case, payment-versus-payment (PvP) FX settlements were successfully orchestrated.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub published a report on Project Promissa, a proof of concept (POC) that explored promissory note tokenization on a distributed ledger technology (DLT) based platform, in partnership with the Swiss National Bank (SNB) and World Bank. Member country payments to multilateral development banks (MDBs) are usually paid in cash or by paper-based promissory notes. The current manual processing of the latter's life cycle events (issuance, encashment, updates and archiving), are time-consuming, cumbersome and require constant reconciliation. The PoC effectively addressed key pain points, with no major issues technical identified, but further study of the legal aspects identified in the preliminary review is needed before moving to any next phases.

Starting in Summer 2025, PayPal will pay U.S. users 3.7% annually in rewards on holdings of PayPal USD (PYUSD) in their PayPal or Venmo wallets. Users will be able to immediately use any rewards received to send to other users, fund international transfers, exchange for fiat, or make purchases at millions of merchants with PayPal Checkout.

Circle will be launching the Circle Payments Network (CPN) to connect financial institutions to enable real-time settlement of cross-border payments using regulated stablecoins. CPN will require participants to meet strict eligibility standards, including licensing, AML/CFT compliance, financial risk management, and cybersecurity protocols. By leveraging USDC, EURC, and other regulated stablecoins, CPN will enable seamless connectivity to domestic real-time payment systems worldwide, while upholding the compliance, security, and trust required for financial institutions to meet their regulatory obligations. Powered by smart contract infrastructure and modular APIs, the network will enable third-party developers to build advanced modules, app services, and automated financial workflows directly on top of CPN.

The Bank of Korea (BOK) "Project Hangang River" wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) backed tokenized deposit pilot is reportedly preparing to launch a second phase as early as October. The current three-month (April 1 to June 30, 2025) phase involves about 100,000 participants, and is limited to person-to-business (P2B) payments (for goods and services at online and offline merchants). In the next phase, person-to-person (P2P) transfers will be added, along with expanded use cases and a full rollout of a digital voucher program for welfare payments by local governments.

Nearly 90% of Bitcoin service providers registered in El Salvador are not operating, based on data from the central bank showing that out of 181 companies officially registered to offer Bitcoin services in the country, 161 are marked as "non-operating." Only 20 firms are still active, including the government-backed Chivo Wallet. At least 22 of the inactive providers may have failed to meet the regulatory standards outlined in Article 4 of the Bitcoin Law Regulation, which requires crypto businesses to operate with "high standards of integrity and honesty."

De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB) surveyed 2,000 Dutch people to find out whether they would be willing to use an offline-digital euro that was as private as cash (funds are stored locally and no third party involved in a payment). Participants were allocated €800 or €3,000 to support themselves, amounts roughly corresponding to a monthly wage for people in lower and middle-income brackets, and asked to allocate their amount across debit cards, digital euro and cash. During the month, half were told there was 99% certainty they could use their debit card for their in-store purchases, and the other half were told only 50% certainty. People in the low certainly group chose to keep not only more cash but also more digital euro in their wallets. However, about a third of participants were reluctant to use the digital euro, most indicating they do not see the added value of the new payment method. https://www.dnb.nl/media/vbrkbg4x/dnb-os-a5-holding-limieten-digitale-euro.pdf

The Brookings Institute published an article by Hanna Halaburda that explores how blockchain systems, initially designed to promote decentralization, can inadvertently lead to new forms of centralization. It highlights that in many blockchain platforms, a small number of participants often gain disproportionate control over governance and decision-making processes, undermining the decentralized ethos. This concentration of power can result from factors like token distribution inequalities, low voter participation, and the influence of early adopters or developers. The article emphasizes the need for vigilant design and governance structures to ensure that blockchain platforms remain truly decentralized and resistant to centralizing tendencies.

[March 11, 2025] Banque des États de l'Afrique Centrale (BEAC) has requested IMF technical assistance to explore the feasibility of introducing a central bank digital currency (CBDC). BEAC serves six central African countries which form the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of the Congo) all of whom use the CFA franc which is pegged to the euro (€1 = CFA 655.957). The BEAC has set up a CBDC working group that will coordinate with the other subregional institutions with the aim of developing a coherent and appropriate regulatory framework to monitor and manage the new risks associated with the emergence of digital payment methods.

[December 10, 2024] The Bank of the Republic of Haiti (BRH) conveyed to IMF staff, in the context of its 2024 Article IV consultation, that it does not plan to immediately implement central bank digital currency (CBDC). However, it stressed the importance of having put a placeholder in the central bank framework, in anticipation of future implementation. IMF staff argued that devoting time and resources to considering a digital money is premature at this stage, given other pending priorities and indicated that if the BRH decides to proceed it should consider all aspects of the project's desirability and feasibility, including a robust evaluation of costs and risks, before proceeding.

The BIS's Jon Frost co-authored a paper that explores the emerging regulatory landscape for stablecoins. It outlines their rapid growth and potential systemic risks they pose, especially as they become more integrated into payment systems and financial markets. The paper advocates for a balanced regulatory approach that ensures financial stability, consumer protection, and innovation. It examines existing regulatory frameworks, including banking, securities, and payments laws, and suggest that a tailored regulatory regime may be necessary to effectively oversee stablecoin issuers and related service providers. The paper also highlights international efforts and the importance of global coordination in regulating stablecoins.

Kyrgyz Republic President Sadyr Japarov signed the constitutional law that will enable the country's central bank to launch a digital som pilot project and create a legal basis for the central bank digital currency (CBDC). The law was adopted by the Parliament on March 20, 2025. The law defines the digital som as the national currency of the Kyrgyz Republic in digital form, which is legal tender in the country. The central bank is granted the exclusive right to issue the digital som, and will establish the procedure for its issue and circulation, as well as organize and ensure functioning of the digital som platform.

The National Bank of Belarus (NBB) reportedly plans to launch a digital ruble in the second half of 2026, starting with "economic agents" and expanding to government agencies and individuals in 2027. The central bank is cooperating very closely with Russian central bank and its central bank digital currency (CBDC) efforts to facilitate digital ruble cross-border transactions. Also, the NBB is working closely with government authorities to ensure that CBDC transactions can be tracked along the entire chain.