The Biggest Payment Networks May Not Be Payment Companies

Hey Payments Fanatic!

People don't wake up thinking they need another payments app.

They open the apps they're already using.

That's what makes X Money interesting. By partnering with Cross River, X is bringing banking and peer-to-peer payments directly into its platform, making financial services part of the experience instead of a separate destination.

The idea itself isn't new. What's different is the scale. X already has millions of users, and now it's adding regulated banking infrastructure instead of asking people to download yet another financial app. If that works, other large consumer platforms will be paying close attention.

You'll also find this week's comparison of Mastercard and American Express, highlighting how two of the industry's biggest payments companies continue to grow through very different business models.

Now, let's dive into today's biggest Payments stories. 👇 See you tomorrow!

Cheers,

Marcel

INSIGHTS

📊 Mastercard 🆚 American Express

Here's how Q1 2026 looked, side by side👇

NEWS

🇺🇸 MassPay partners with Finexio to launch cross-border AP payments in 180+ countries. Under the partnership, Finexio customers will initiate international vendor payments from their existing AP workflow, and MassPay's infrastructure will handle routing, funds delivery, and local payment rails in each market, with screening and verification built into the flow.

🌎 ACI Worldwide and dLocal bring Latin America's leading local payment methods to global merchants. The partnership enables ACI's enterprise merchants and FinTech partners to expand into Latin America through a single integration while maintaining full control over their payment strategy.

🇦🇪 3s Money has partnered with IFZA Dubai to provide eligible businesses with multi-currency accounts, international payments, foreign exchange services, and AED account capabilities, supporting companies as they expand their global operations.

🇺🇸 Cross River powers X Money. With Cross River providing the banking backbone and X connecting users across the United States, the collaboration represents a new standard for money movement, combining compliance, speed, and scale in a way that meets the needs of today’s digital-first consumers.

🇺🇸 Visa to cut 7% of workforce as CEO seeks to revamp payments firm. Visa will eliminate approximately 2,600 jobs as part of an efficiency drive aimed at reallocating resources to higher-growth areas. The payments giant plans to reinvest in consumer payments, commercial and money movement solutions, stablecoins, cross-border payments, and value-added services.

🇨🇳 Africa's largest bank helps China reshape cross-border payments with $1.2 billion in transactions. Standard Bank has processed more than CNY8 billion in payments through China's Cross-Border Interbank Payment System (CIPS) within a year of becoming Africa's first direct participant.

🇺🇸 PEX secures $160m to scale payments, credit and finance automation platform. The firm will use the capital to accelerate growth of its charge card programme, spend management platform, and invest in sales and partnerships. Continue reading

🌍 PayPal and Amazon launch PayPal Ratenzahlung, a buy now, pay later for customers in Germany and Austria. With PayPal Ratenzahlung, customers benefit from a clear way to split purchases between 30€ and 10,000€2 into fixed monthly payments.

🇺🇸 Corpay introduces agent card capability to power secure agentic commerce. With Agent Card, Corpay extends their AI first approach a step further, allowing AI agents to act on a business's behalf directly, within the same controls that have always defined Corpay's approach to payments.

🇿🇦 NjiaPay launches one-click payments solution to transform South Africa’s ecommerce checkout. The new offering enables merchants to provide a faster checkout experience across multiple payment providers, unlike traditional one-click solutions that are often limited to a single payment service provider.

🌍 The Central Bank of the UAE and Indonesia strengthen strategic ties to advance cross-border payment connectivity. By interconnecting payment systems and implementing Local Currency Transactions (LCT), the partnership aims to facilitate faster, transparent, and cost-effective financial flows to support bilateral trade.

🌎 Brazil and Argentina embrace stablecoins, defying IMF red flags, central bank bans. The IMF said crypto rails, led by stablecoins, now process most cross-border transfers in Brazil, while major Argentine banking groups are developing peso-backed stablecoins for institutional use, highlighting growing adoption of digital assets across Latin America.

🇮🇹 Satispay has secured a €30 million securitisation backed by Credito Lombardo Veneto to support the expansion of its "Paga in 3" buy now, pay later service. The deal provides new funding for the BNPL platform while highlighting growing collaboration between traditional banks and FinTech companies in Italy.

🇩🇴 Asprofin Bank and Digital TRVST launch BaaS alliance as embedded finance hits $7 trillion. This alliance enables Digital TRVST to offer licensed banking services, including Mastercard programs and institutional custody, targeting a projected $5 billion in annual transaction volume.

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