Money20/20 Europe Observations: How real-time payments, agentic AI, and tokenized settlement are reshaping financial infrastructure

Money20/20 Europe Observations: How Real-Time Payments, Agentic AI, and Tokenized Settlement Are Reshaping Financial Infrastructure

Introduction

In the third day of discussions at Money20/20 Europe in Amsterdam, the fintech industry’s focus had clearly shifted from “showcasing new technologies” to “how to actually deploy new systems in a regulated environment.” Discussions around digital payments, banking innovation, AI in finance, stablecoins, tokenized deposits, and cybersecurity show that financial institutions are facing triple pressure from speed, compliance, and trust at the same time. Whether it is the efficiency bottlenecks of cross-border payments or the new identity verification issues brought by agentic AI, the industry consensus is that the next phase of competition will depend on whether financial infrastructure can balance real-time capability, auditability, and scalability.

Industry Background

The global payments and banking industry is in a period of structural transformation. Real-time payment networks are rapidly gaining traction in multiple markets, digital banks continue evolving into integrated financial service platforms, and open banking and embedded finance are further tightening the connections among accounts, payments, and data. At the same time, cross-border payments remain one of the areas where cost, latency, and transparency issues are most pronounced, especially in enterprise settlement, supply chain payments, and multi-currency treasury management, where the efficiency limits of traditional correspondent banking systems remain evident.

Against this backdrop, fintech companies and infrastructure providers have begun focusing on “orchestrable payment rails”: transactions no longer rely on a single network, but switch between fiat currency, stablecoins, tokenized deposits, and different clearing systems depending on the use case. This also explains why discussions in recent years around CBDCs, stablecoins, and tokenization have gradually extended from theory to operational practice.

Multiple discussions on the third day of Money20/20 Europe revolved around the same core question: how to build faster payments and more controllable automation processes in a highly regulated, risk-sensitive environment.

Current Developments

Agentic AI Is Challenging Traditional Identity Frameworks

One of the standout themes at the conference was the rapid emergence of autonomous AI agents in financial operations. Unlike traditional KYC models centered on human subjects, agentic AI requires a new identity and permission governance framework better suited to machine participation in transactions and decision-making. The ideas raised in the discussion were not simply about letting machines “authenticate like humans,” but about building a layered governance structure that creates clear boundaries between human authorization, enterprise control, and machine execution.This shift means that digital identity is expanding from “verifying who an individual is” to “verifying what a system is permitted to do.” For banks and payment institutions, this is not only a technical issue, but also a compliance design issue. The growth of machine-to-machine (M2M) transactions is prompting regulators and the industry to rethink how KYC, audit trails, permission controls, and anomalous transaction detection are handled.

The long-term competition between banking licenses and digital banks

The development of digital banks is also continuing to move from “rapid growth” toward “securing core licenses and deepening product capabilities.” The conference discussion noted that some digital banks are seeking more complete banking licenses in order to reduce product fragmentation, improve customer experience, and gain stronger institutional recognition under regulatory scrutiny.

This reflects a practical trend in banking innovation: relying solely on front-end experience is no longer enough to build long-term competitiveness. What truly determines value is the underlying payment infrastructure, risk management capability, and compliance capability. For fintech companies, obtaining a banking license or forming deeper collaboration with licensed institutions may better support scale than expanding a single product.

Cross-border payments are evolving toward real-time and direct connections

Cross-border payments remain one of the recurring topics at Money20/20 Europe. In the discussion, many institutions focused on bypassing traditional card networks or shortening settlement paths, emphasizing the value of account-to-account (A2A) payments and instant payment rails. Regional payment initiatives, real-time payment networks, and more localized settlement arrangements are reshaping how businesses and merchants settle funds.

For cross-border commerce, improvements in this kind of infrastructure can not only reduce fees, but also shorten the time capital is tied up and improve treasury liquidity management. Especially in supply chain payments, B2B trade, and multi-jurisdiction operations, faster settlement means less operational friction and greater cash flow visibility.

Tokenized deposits and stablecoins are moving from “narrative” to “settlement tool”

Topics related to digital assets were notably more pragmatic at this year’s conference. The focus was no longer on speculating about market prices, but on how tokenised deposits, stablecoins, and CBDCs can serve real settlement needs. Participants were concerned with how to reduce the time funds remain stuck in legacy clearing systems, how to make cross-border transfers faster, and how to keep settlement traceable within a compliance framework.This change also shows that industry discussions around Crypto & Web3 are shifting from speculation to infrastructure. Stablecoins are mentioned so frequently not only because of their cross-border transfer efficiency, but also because in some scenarios they can serve as an intermediary layer connecting fiat systems with digital asset rails. At the same time, tokenised deposits are seen as a way for the banking system to optimize settlement efficiency internally.

Security concerns are extending from anti-fraud to post-quantum protection

As payment speeds increase, the complexity of risk management is also rising. Security discussions at the conference focused on threats such as “harvest now, decrypt later,” where attackers collect encrypted data today and wait until quantum computing capabilities mature in the future before breaking it. Issues like this show that financial institutions need to prepare today for long-term security upgrades, rather than waiting to act until regulatory mandates appear.

At the same time, real-time fraud protection is increasingly being embedded into the transaction flow itself. The industry is shifting from post-event interception to continuous risk control before, during, and after transactions. For payment institutions and banks, this means greater system complexity, but also fewer losses and stronger compliance explainability.

Impact on the financial system

1. Significant improvement in payment efficiency

Real-time payment networks, A2A settlement, and shorter cross-border clearing chains can significantly improve payment efficiency. Corporate finance, merchant collections, and supply chain finance scenarios will all benefit from faster fund arrival and greater visibility into funds. For financial infrastructure operators, this means supporting lower latency, higher concurrency, and stronger interoperability.

2. Expanded potential for financial inclusion

Lower-cost digital payments and more flexible cross-border settlement tools are expected to improve financial accessibility for SMEs and participants in emerging markets. Especially in markets where traditional correspondent banking coverage is insufficient or too costly, new payment infrastructure can lower the barrier to entry and connect more entities to the global commercial network.

3. The competitive logic of banking is changing

The boundaries between digital banks, traditional banks, and fintech continue to blur. The focus of competition is no longer just user interface experience, but compliance capabilities, product integration, and settlement efficiency. Institutions that can integrate open banking, embedded finance, and real-time payment capabilities may be more likely to build lasting retention and higher-frequency transaction scenarios.

4. Compliance costs are rising, but becoming more granularAs AI in finance, digital identity, and tokenization applications increase, regulators’ requirements for auditing, access control, and anti-money laundering will become more granular. In the short term, this may drive up compliance costs; but in the long term, more automated compliance processes may also reduce the burden of manual review and improve the efficiency of risk identification.

5. Risk management models are being reshaped

Agentic AI, real-time payments, and cross-border instant settlement are creating new requirements for risk management. Banks and payment institutions need stronger capabilities in anomaly detection, layered permissions, and behavior tracing. Future risk-control systems may no longer be single-point tools, but rather a continuous control system that spans identity, transactions, and clearing.

Challenges Ahead

Data Privacy and Identity Governance

When AI agents participate in financial operations, who has the authority, who bears responsibility, and who can audit their actions will all become key issues. Traditional identity systems designed for natural persons may not be sufficient to cover machine agents, enterprise consoles, and multi-layer permission structures.

Cybersecurity and Post-Quantum Risk

Real-time processing and automation, while improving efficiency, also expand the attack surface. Financial institutions need to address traditional fraud, account takeover, API abuse, and longer-term cryptographic migration risks at the same time. Post-quantum security is no longer a distant topic, but part of infrastructure planning.

Technical Integration and Interoperability

The coexistence of cross-border payments, stablecoins, tokenised deposits, CBDC, and traditional banking systems means technical integration will become more complex. How to interconnect different clearing rails, how to reconcile accounts, and how to unify risk-control standards remain major obstacles in implementation.

Regulatory Uncertainty

Regulators in different regions do not take exactly the same stance on stablecoins, digital identity, and AI. For financial institutions operating across borders, this fragmented regulatory environment increases the difficulty of product design and compliance deployment. Especially when new technologies enter real transaction flows, regulatory clarity often directly affects the speed of commercialization.

Future Outlook

Over the next three to five years, the fintech industry’s focus will likely shift from “individual innovation” to “system-level orchestration.” Real-time payment networks will continue to expand, digital banks will further strengthen core banking capabilities, and open banking and embedded finance will remain important foundations for account and payment integration. AI’s role in finance will also expand from customer service and assisted review to more complex transaction orchestration and compliance support, but only on the premise of establishing clearer boundaries of responsibility and auditable architectures.In the field of digital assets, stablecoins, CBDC, and tokenised deposits may develop in parallel rather than replace one another. Different tools will serve different scenarios such as cross-border payments, institutional settlement, and liquidity management. Regulators are more likely to adopt a “risk-based” rather than a “one-size-fits-all” approach to governance, with a focus on data security, identity verification, anti-money laundering, and systemic stability.

From the discussions on the third day of Money20/20 Europe, the industry is no longer describing the future as a single end state, but as an era of financial infrastructure with multiple tracks advancing in parallel and gradually converging. The real winners may not be the companies that first proposed the concept, but the institutions that are best able to deliver speed, compliance, and trust all at once.

Conclusion

The signals from the third day of Money20/20 Europe are clear: the digitization of the financial system is entering a more pragmatic phase. Real-time payments, agentic AI, cross-border settlement optimization, stablecoin applications, and post-quantum security are no longer just independent topics, but different modules within the same future financial architecture. For banks, payment institutions, and fintech companies, the next competitive focus will be how to integrate these capabilities into financial infrastructure that is sustainable, compliant, and scalable.