News
Weekly Global News Wrap: Trump floats 10% card rate cap; Citi to cut 1,000 jobs
Weekly Global News Wrap: Trump floats 10% card rate cap; Citi to cut 1,000 jobs
And Credit Agricole wins ECB approval to lift Banco BPM stake above 20%.
Taiwanese domestic banks’ SME loans rise to $341.94b in November
Loans extended to SMEs by domestic banks account for 64.7% of total loans.
BSP extension lets banks write bigger green loans beyond 25% cap
Banks can exceed the single borrower’s limit by an additional 15%.
Southeast Asia fintech funding fell 21% in 2025
This is despite Airwallex and Superbank doing well in their fund raising and IPO.
Taiwan banks add $6.69b loans in November as bad debts tick up
The average NPL ratio is 0.16% with bad loans rising by $0.06b.
Singapore Gulf Bank gains access to J.P. Morgan’s USD clearing network
The bank can receive and credit clients’ incoming funds over weekends and holidays.
MUFG Bank sets up structured trade solutions subsidiary in Singapore
It is wholly owned by the Japanese megabank’s consolidated subsidiary.
HSBC nabs Citi Global Wealth COO as new CCO for IWPB business
Valentín Valderrábano will relocate to Hong Kong from New York.
Thailand’s Krungsri names new two new senior executives
Duangdao Wongpanitkrit and Hiroshi Kurihara took over their new roles last 1 January.
Australia’s big four banks loan deferrals, waive fees for bushfire victims
NAB is providing A$1,000 grants and additional financial relief, for example.
Ant International and Google to soon enable AI checkout in chat
The UCP establishes a common language for agents and systems to operate together.
MUFG invests $4.3b in India’s Shriram Finance
MUFG is subscribing to a preferential allotment of 20% equity shares in the NBFC.
This week in banking: PAO Bank assets surge, Malaysia upgraded by FATF, global bank values climb, HK deposits rise
A new cross-border payment partnership has also been formed.
MUFG deploys real-time anonymization across unstructured data
On-premises processing keeps MUFG data off external clouds
PAObank offers 1% savings boost via Money Safe
Customers can activate the safety feature that protects their deposits until 31 March 2026.
Agentic AI to reshape Asian banking, report says
Agentic and multiagent AI boost banking efficiency and cut costs.
Axis Bank debuts industry-first SMS Shield feature
The Safety Centre also allows customers switch off or restrict specific digital banking functions.
Commentary
Banks retreat, private credit advances: Asia Pacific’s quiet lending revolution
Human Sparsity Blockchain: A citizen-validated ledger for digital finance supervision
Will stablecoins disrupt the banking business?
Digital transformation starts with leadership
The future of Asian banking isn’t ‘AI-first’ – it’s ‘fearless-first’