Meta’s Muse: The Angel or Demon of Payments?
Hey FinTech Fanatic!
AI agents are finally moving from conference slides into real payments. 👀
Meta’s Muse can now browse, compare products, fill out checkout pages and pay on a consumer’s behalf, with Stripe’s payment infrastructure built into the experience from the start.
And that makes the Amazon story particularly interesting. Amazon has started blocking Muse shopping sessions, arguing that the agent is not authorised to access its site. Meta, meanwhile, says Muse does not see users’ passwords or payment details.
There’s a bigger question underneath the dispute: who is actually responsible when an AI agent makes a payment? The customer approved it, the agent initiated it, the merchant processed it — and the payment provider sits somewhere in between.
The wallet layer could make this even more interesting. Muse already supports wallets such as Stripe Link and PayPal, while Meta appears to be building its own Meta Connect wallet too. If agents become the place where identities, payment credentials and purchase decisions come together, wallets suddenly become much more than a way to pay.
And PayPal is already moving in that direction, partnering with Meta to let users shop and check out through Muse across its merchant network.
The technology is moving quickly. The rules around consent, liability, fraud and merchant control are still catching up.
So is AI becoming the angel of payments, making every transaction easier — or the demon that makes every transaction harder to trust?
Let’s get into today’s FinTech stories. 👇
See you tomorrow!
Cheers,
INSIGHTS
💡 Incognia: 81% of Financial Institutions Say Mule Account Handovers Are Rising. Incognia’s new research, based on a survey of 511 fraud, risk and AML professionals, finds that mule account handovers are becoming harder to catch, with only 16% of institutions detecting them before suspicious transactions occur. The report also finds that 64% have suspected or confirmed cross-border cases, while 53% say handovers are harder to detect than most other types of fraud. The bigger problem? 83% are still detecting them reactively, after suspicious activity or funds have already started moving. Read the full report here.
FINTECH NEWS
🇺🇸 Feedzai unveils Farol, an embedded AI agent designed to slash fraud investigation times and sharpen threat detection across banking risk operations. Integrated directly into Feedzai's RiskOps Studio, Farol delivers conversational intelligence and automated rule analytics within existing analyst workflows.
🇺🇸 New York sues Polymarket, saying it ran an illegal gambling operation in violation of state law. The lawsuit seeks to block Polymarket from operating in New York and names the platform's founder as a defendant.
🇨🇴 Colombian FinTech Monni launches multi-currency wallet waitlist ahead of its full rollout in Colombia. The Barranquilla-based startup supports accounts in USD, EUR, COP and MXN, with currency conversion and an international debit card, and plans to add a credit card by Q3 2027.
🇨🇴 FinTech Meru launches in Colombia as a financial super app, offering up to 7% variable yield on USDC, 10% cashback on MeruCard Visa purchases at select retailers, and stock investing. The platform aims to let Colombians manage money, access DeFi and earn rewards from a single app.
HOW FINTECH PERFORMED LAST WEEK
📈 A snapshot of last week’s stock moves across public FinTechs:
PAYMENTS NEWS
🇺🇸 LoanPro launches a virtual Mastercard for in-house payment processing for lenders, enabling them to issue cards directly within their lending infrastructure. The product aims to streamline payment processing for lenders by keeping card issuance and loan servicing on a single platform.
🌍 Meta's Muse made agent payments a mass market product, but liability questions around autonomous AI transactions have not kept pace. A Finextra analysis examines the regulatory gaps emerging as AI agents begin executing payments at scale without clear frameworks for accountability.
🇪🇺 ECB to assess feasibility of interlinking with Brazil's Pix, the instant payment system processing roughly 250 million daily transactions. The ECB will explore technical, operational, legal and business considerations for connecting TIPS with Pix to enable faster, lower cost cross-border payments between the euro area and Brazil.
🇵🇱 BLIK joins dynamic payment methods on Stripe, enabling merchants in over 30 countries to automatically offer BLIK to Polish shoppers. BLIK accounts for more than 70% of Polish e-commerce transactions and can now be displayed at checkout based on user location and payment context without separate integrations.
🇺🇸 Slash introduces payment processing to help merchants accept debit and credit card payments, partnering with Whop to power the underlying infrastructure. The feature launches via native card acceptance in Slash Invoicing and an SDK for custom checkout flows, with settlement and merchant onboarding handled by Whop.
🇺🇸 Corpay expands its AI agent team inside Corpay Complete, adding purpose-built agents across corporate, fleet and vendor payments. Each agent handles a specific task with finance-grade controls, building on the AI Virtual Assistant and Agent Card launched earlier this year.
🇺🇸 FedNow opens the door to cross-border instant payments, marking the system's first expansion beyond U.S. borders since its 2023 launch. Banks and credit unions will be able to serve customers whose payments involve parties outside the U.S., with FedNow handling the domestic leg of each transaction.
DIGITAL BANKING NEWS
🇭🇺 Revolut is bringing ATMs to Hungary, expanding physical cash access for its customers in the country. The rollout will allow Hungarian Revolut users to withdraw cash at dedicated Revolut ATMs across the country.
🇧🇩 VEON joint venture receives a digital bank license in Bangladesh, granted by Bangladesh Bank to a joint venture between VEON Digital Financial Group and Square Group. The approval enables VEON to expand digital banking services for mobile users across Bangladesh, building on Banglalink's existing payments infrastructure.
🇺🇸 Narmi launches an open AI marketplace for community banks, giving smaller institutions access to AI tools through its digital banking platform. The marketplace aims to help community banks deploy AI capabilities without building them in house.
🇬🇧 NatWest Group unveils next-generation AI tools including an industry-first generative audio-visual Spending Insights tool and a new Fraud Triage Agent within its Cora assistant. Powered by proprietary Small Language Models, the tools let customers explore spending through natural voice conversations and reach fraud support faster.
BLOCKCHAIN/CRYPTO NEWS
🇸🇬 Crypto exchange Bitget halts withdrawals after a $352 million hack, with unauthorized transfers detected from some of its hot wallets. CEO Gracy Chen said user funds are safe, noting the loss falls within Bitget's User Protection Fund of over $464M.
🇭🇰 Paxos Labs launches PAXGy, a token built on PAX Gold that is designed to grow in PAXG terms as reserves earn returns from institutional gold leasing. Holders can deposit PAXG or swap stablecoins to receive PAXGy, with the product available through OKX Gold Earn and X Layer.
🇺🇸 Ondo Finance launches Intelligent Portfolios powered by BlackRock, delivering curated investment strategies as single transferable onchain tokens. The first three portfolios cover high income, diversified growth, and high growth, with BlackRock developing the strategies specifically for Ondo.
🌍 Fireblocks integrates Cardano native tokens to support institutional adoption of the Cardano ecosystem. The integration allows Fireblocks clients to custody and transfer Cardano native tokens through its institutional infrastructure.
🌐 AxLabs releases Simple Agent Wallet for autonomous AI payments across EVM, Solana and Hedera blockchains using the x402 payment protocol. The open-source CLI tool lets AI agents inspect and execute payments without human intervention, removing friction from browser-based confirmation flows.
STABLECOINS NEWS
🇺🇸 The U.S. Federal Reserve proposes new stablecoin rules covering banks and non-banks that issue dollar-denominated stablecoins. The proposal sets out requirements for reserve backing, redemption rights, and risk management across stablecoin issuers.
🇻🇬 Tether confirms funds stuck at EQIBank after U.S. seizes $84.2M tied to Capstone, with the DOJ filing a civil forfeiture complaint targeting accounts at Wells Fargo and other institutions. Tether says the exposure is less than 0.034% of group assets and that it had no knowledge of the alleged conduct.
PARTNERSHIPS
🇺🇸 Bullish, Alpaca, and Apex Finech form a coalition to push issuer-backed tokenized securities standards. The Issuer Sponsored Token Coalition will work on technical standards, settlement, and custody to ensure tokenized shares remain tied to official shareholder records preserving voting and dividend rights.
🌍 Swift and Wells Fargo join Linux Foundation Decentralized Trust, expanding the consortium's reach into traditional financial infrastructure. The membership signals growing institutional interest in collaborative blockchain and decentralized technology standards.
🇨🇭 Bitget partners with Sygnum Bank for off-exchange custody, becoming the latest major crypto exchange to use the Swiss digital asset bank's services. The arrangement allows Bitget to secure assets through regulated custody infrastructure while maintaining trading flexibility.
🇺🇸 Cash App partners with Workday to bring direct deposit to more earners, appearing as an option within Workday's enhanced direct deposit experience starting October 1. The integration aims to help freelancers, gig workers and side hustlers route paychecks into Cash App more easily.
🇺🇸 Vise partners with Bitwise to launch integrated crypto model portfolios for RIAs, giving registered investment advisors access to digital asset allocations. The partnership aims to help advisors incorporate crypto into client portfolios through Vise's platform.
🇺🇸 Santander Bank partners with the Miami Dolphins and Hard Rock Stadium for the 2026 NFL season, supporting its brand expansion in South Florida. The deal includes the Santander Red Zone activation on stadium videoboards and builds on the bank's deepening investment in the Miami market dating back to 1979.
🇸🇬 DBS and Avaloq expand their 18-year partnership as the bank targets S$1 trillion in retail and wealth assets by 2030. The two firms signed a MoU to jointly develop new wealth management capabilities across DBS's markets and business lines.
🇫🇷 BNP Paribas partners with Google Cloud to bring AI deeper into banking, signing a five-year deal to expand its use of Gemini models and Google Cloud infrastructure. It will also deploy AI agents across workflows including corporate credit memos, sales, trading and research, while keeping strict controls around sensitive data.
DONEDEAL FUNDING NEWS
🇺🇸 Limited closes an $18.5M seed round preempted by Third Prime, less than 10 months after launch. The company offers multi-region business accounts and payments across the US, EU, UK, LATAM, and Africa, with North Island Ventures doubling down alongside new investors including ParaFi Capital and Digital Currency Group.
🇺🇸 Strive raises an estimated $86M through SATA preferred stock sales over three trading sessions, enough to buy roughly 1,002 BTC according to BitcoinTreasuries.net estimates. Strive last reported holding 26,355 BTC after purchasing 1,355 BTC the prior week.
🇧🇷 Brazil's Stay raises $5.8M Series A to expand corporate pensions, targeting growth in the country's employer sponsored retirement market. Read more
M&A
🇦🇷 Revolut receives central bank approval to acquire Banco Cetelem in Argentina, marking a significant step in the company's Latin American expansion. The approval allows Revolut to operate as a licensed bank in Argentina for the first time.
🇩🇪 Commerzbank could buy UniCredit's HVB as part of a bank tie-up, according to Commerzbank's CEO. A potential deal would see HVB absorbed into Commerzbank as part of broader merger negotiations between the two banks.
🇭🇰 CoinMarketCap acquires Coinglass, the crypto derivatives data platform covering 28 exchanges and 2,500+ instruments. The deal brings open interest, funding rates and liquidation data to CoinMarketCap's 115 million monthly users.
🌐 Citrea acquires Crest, a self-custodial privacy wallet, to make private digital asset transactions more accessible. The wallet will launch on Citrea's execution environment with automatic shielding, private transfers and cross-chain swaps between BTC and EVM networks.
MOVERS & SHAKERS
🇧🇷 Guilherme Lago, former CFO of Nubank, has joined Latin American VC firm Kaszek as a partner. Kaszek, an early Nubank backer, is closing its seventh fund at an expected $600M according to reports.
🇩🇪 Jochen Siegert joins Green Banana as an advisor, bringing payments expertise to the Frankfurt FinTech as it builds out its European BNPL infrastructure. Siegert and Laura Treude will support the company's market standard strategy for Buy Now Pay Later.
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