The Central Bank of Syria has announced the approval of a new electronic payment and money transfer system, authorised under a presidential decision. The initiative is intended to modernise the country’s financial infrastructure and expand digital transaction options for both individuals and businesses.

Framework structure and scope

According to the central bank, the new system is designed to build a modern national payments infrastructure, facilitate money transfers, and broaden the range of available payment options. The bank clarified that the framework does not eliminate the use of cash, nor does it mandate the use of any specific payment method.

The regulatory structure establishes technical and operational rules covering three main categories of participants: payment service providers, electronic money providers, and payment system operators. In addition to defining these categories, the framework is intended to open the payments sector to greater competition, investment, and financial technology innovation.

A notable feature of the new regulatory approach is the provision for a supervised testing environment, allowing new financial products and services to be trialled under regulatory oversight before wider market introduction. This approach is commonly associated with regulatory sandbox models used in other jurisdictions to balance innovation with consumer and systemic safeguards.

Governance and risk considerations

The Central Bank of Syria stated that the framework also sets standards for governance, risk management, cybersecurity, and consumer protection. These provisions support the operational integrity of the payment ecosystem as new providers and services are introduced under the regulatory structure.

Looking ahead, the central bank indicated that the new system could eventually support the integration of Syria’s financial infrastructure with regional and international payment systems. However, this would remain contingent on meeting legal, technical, and commercial requirements. The bank was explicit in stating that the current approval does not mean international transfers or cross-border payment links will become immediately available.

SEON has reported that World Cup betting and gaming fraud moved from registration to cash-out, with suspicious withdrawals rising 38% compared to 2025.

Fraud prevention and anti-money laundering (AML) technology company SEON has published an analysis of betting and gaming operator data collected during the 2026 FIFA World Cup, concluding that fraud pressure during the tournament concentrated at withdrawal stage rather than at registration, as is typically expected around major sporting events.

According to SEON, though as assumed, the registration volume did increase, betting and gaming operators also deliberately reduced sign-up friction to remain competitive for new players. That resulted in a 16% fall in sign-up block rates.

Suspicious withdrawal activity increased across every region measured. SEON attributes this to withdrawals flagged for unusual size or timing, including single high-value requests made from accounts with no prior withdrawal history. The average value of a flagged withdrawal more than doubled, from USD 202 to USD 436, indicating a shift by fraudsters from numerous small-value attempts towards fewer, higher-value exits.

Dormant accounts reactivated for coordinated withdrawals

The report identifies dormant accounts, previously verified but inactive, as a central indicator of fraud during the tournament. SEON recorded an 83% increase in daily identity mismatches linked to dormant accounts reactivating across its network, rising to 118% in Latin America. These accounts had completed verification well before the tournament began. When reactivated, often on unfamiliar devices, they were used to attempt high-value withdrawals. Credential-stuffing campaigns rose by 115% in Europe over the same period, a pattern SEON links to the exploitation of previously established account trust.

Latin America vs. Europe and North America

While registration blocks fell in most markets, Latin America recorded the opposite trend. Registration block rates in the region rose by 19%, and synthetic-identity blocks increased by 34% compared to baseline and by 64% in contrast to the 2025 control period. The company suggests this reflects existing detection rules responding to a surge in registration volume rather than a deliberate tightening of controls, with the region’s false-positive rate also rising under the increased load.

Standard Chartered and HSBC have completed the first live cross-border tokenised deposit transaction on Swift’s blockchain-based ledger.

The UK-based banks confirmed the transaction represents the first interbank use case executed on the infrastructure, following Swift’s announcement in July 2026 that its blockchain-based ledger was ready for initial use. At that stage, 17 banks across six continents had been named as participants preparing to pilot tokenised deposit transactions aimed at supporting 24/7 payment availability and liquidity efficiency.

How the transaction was processed

The transaction was performed through the exchange of payment messages between HSBC and Standard Chartered over Swift’s ledger. The obligations that resulted were registered as tokenised deposit obligations on two separate systems: HSBC’s Tokenised Deposit Service and Standard Chartered’s tokenised-deposit infrastructure.

Swift’s blockchain-based ledger functioned as an orchestration layer in the process, allowing the obligations generated by each bank to be matched and netted before final settlement took place through existing settlement systems.

Industry context and implications

Tokenised deposits usage in cross-border transactions is being explored across the banking industry to extend payment availability beyond standard operating hours and reduce the frictions associated with correspondent banking arrangements.

Lewis Sun, Head of Digital Currencies, HSBC, describes the transaction as confirmation that digital money issued by banks can move between institutions while remaining within existing regulatory oversight.

Furthermore, Craig Ramsey, Global Head, Account-to-Account Payments at ACI Worldwide, states that the live tokenised deposit transaction is proof of a concept converting to a practical application inside the existing financial system. Ramsey adds that the transaction’s significance doesn’t lie in the technology it is based on, but rather on the system’s capacity to increase liquidity across institutions.

DEUNA, an agentic payments intelligence platform for enterprise commerce, has broadened its existing collaboration with PayPal to bring the full PayPal product suite into DEUNA’s payments infrastructure. The expanded agreement gives enterprise merchants access to PayPal Wallet, Venmo and PayPal’s Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) offering through a single API integration, in every market where DEUNA operates.

From regional collaboration to global rollout

The expansion builds on earlier work between the two companies on Express Checkout and PayPal Vaulting. That collaboration originated in Latin America, where, according to PayPal, it supported merchants across the region before evolving into what is now described as a global partnership. The companies stated that new product integrations are expected to be disclosed in the future, though no further detail was provided.

According to Baymard Institute, one in five online shoppers abandon a purchase because the checkout process is too long or complicated. Separate industry estimates referenced by the companies put the annual cost of poor checkout design at USD 260 billion in lost ecommerce revenue across the US and EU. For merchants operating in multiple markets, maintaining separate payment integrations for each product adds further operational complexity, a factor DEUNA and PayPal pointed to as a driver for the expanded partnership.

Through the agreement, merchants using DEUNA’s unified API can access PayPal Wallet, which the companies said has 439 million active accounts across approximately 200 markets. Venmo, a US-based social payments network with more than 90 million active users concentrated among younger consumers, is also included. PayPal’s Pay Later product, the companies said, processed more than USD 40 billion in total payment volume in 2025 across 60 million users globally, with 96% classified as repeat users.

Reducing integration overhead for enterprise merchants

Rather than building and maintaining separate connections for each PayPal product, merchants can activate the full suite through DEUNA’s existing API, which the companies said reduces engineering overhead when adopting new payment capabilities or expanding into additional markets. The partnership is aimed at enterprise merchants operating at scale, including global retailers, quick-service restaurant chains, travel and ticketing platforms, subscription businesses, and US-focused consumer brands.

Binance has introduced Agent OS, a developer platform and standardised access layer designed to connect AI applications to the exchange’s trading, market data, wallet, payment, and on-chain capabilities across both crypto and traditional markets. The platform forms part of Binance Intelligence, the exchange’s initiative focused on AI-powered products and services, and is aimed at AI builders, fintech developers, and quantitative trading teams seeking a controlled environment for building applications and agents that interact with Binance’s financial infrastructure. Agent OS supports both pre-built integrations and developers’ own AI agents.

A standardised developer layer

Agent OS combines several existing Binance components, including its APIs, the Binance Wallet Agentic Hub, Binance x402 programmable payments, and the Binance Skill Hub, alongside newly introduced support for the Model Context Protocol (MCP). MCP is an open standard that allows compatible AI applications to connect with external tools. By integrating MCP into Agent OS, Binance provides developers and partners with a standardised method for linking their applications and agents to its platform, reducing the need to build separate integrations for each individual product or use case.

Through supported AI tools such as ChatGPT, Claude Code, Codex and Cursor, users can authorise agents to access market data, review account information and carry out supported trading activities, subject to permissions and limits that users configure themselves. Each agent can also be assigned to a dedicated subaccount, allowing funds and trading activity to be segregated from a user’s main account.

Jeff Li, VP of Product at Binance, said the platform addresses fragmentation in agentic finance development across crypto and traditional markets, noting that it is intended to provide developers and quantitative trading teams with consistent data access, low-latency infrastructure, and standardised interfaces to support AI-driven trading strategies.

User-controlled access and monitoring

Binance’s initial MCP implementation allows compatible AI applications to access market data, view read-only account information and place trades. Through the MCP server, users can assign an agent to a dedicated subaccount, configure its permissions and revoke its access at any time.