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To establish functional and widely used independent payment services, the blocs of emerging economies must overcome a range of challenges, including inter-alliance disputes, variation in foreign policy priorities and geopolitical pressures.

As Australia moves towards a new regulatory regime for payment service providers (PSPs), the regulator’s focus on pricing, reporting and exploiting financial difficulty challenges organisations to embed stronger controls and forward-looking governance.

On August 13, 2025, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) launched a consultation on proposed amendments to the Regulations governing the BankID NBU System. The purpose of these amendments is to bring Ukraine’s digital identification framework into closer alignment with Regulation (EU) No. 910/2014 on electronic identification and trust services (eIDAS) and the Law of Ukraine on Electronic Identification and Trust Services. The consultation closed on August 25, 2025 and, to date, there has not yet been any regulatory movement. The draft text introduces harmonised definitions, sets out detailed contractual obligations and requires the creation of termination plans. By mirroring EU eIDAS standards on digital identity and trust services, these reforms aim to foster greater consumer trust, enhance competition and lay the groundwork for a secure and interoperable open banking system in the country.

The Bank of England’s (BoE) consultation on stablecoins, launched in November 2025, could represent a pivotal moment in determining how digital currencies will function within the UK financial system.

Forthcoming legislation is expected to replicate models adopted in comparable jurisdictions by providing clear regulation of stablecoins and clarifying the boundary between payment stablecoins and securities.

In a decision with wide-reaching implications for consumer rights and digital commerce, the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit recently vacated the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) Click-to-Cancel rule, which was finalized in 2024 and final disclosure and cancellation requirements were set to take effect on July 14, 2025. Initially proposed in 2023 as a commonsense extension to the FTC’s Negative Option Rule, which protects consumers from being charged for goods or services they did not explicitly agree to purchase, Click-to-Cancel would have required businesses to allow consumers to cancel subscriptions through the same simple method used to enroll typically, online and in one click. The rule would have applied to any business that offers automatically renewing subscriptions, such as streaming services and “subscribe and save” billing models.

The new strategy challenges card networks’ dominance and plans for multi-money interoperability, but its success will depend on whether payment service providers (PSPs) can adapt their business models through a multi-year transformation.

In August 2025, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published Policy Statement PS25/12, setting out changes to the safeguarding regime for payments and e-money firms. Vixio’s Playbook is designed to break down the FCA’s new requirements into plain English to help compliance and risk leaders understand what has changed compared to the previous regime.

Nigeria and South Africa’s differing approaches to digital payments reflect two distinct paths set to converge in 2026, as regional interoperability takes shape.

More than a year after the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) introduced its authorised push payment (APP) fraud reimbursement framework, debate over its efficacy and fairness continues, and its future remains uncertain.