However, building trust remains an ongoing challenge for the industry.
Despite a wave of innovation in global trade payments, panelists warned that without trust underpinning the system, everything will collapse, panelists said during the meeting. Rewiring the global value chain: Dual engines of AI and payments panel of Singapore Fintech Festival 2025 in Singapore on November 13th.
Livia Benisti Banking Circle’s chief external affairs officer said that even as money begins to move across a growing combination of interoperable payment rails, the real imperative is to keep those flows within secure, trusted and regulated networks.
He said the word “trust” was mentioned several times rather than the word “agency” in several panels at the Singapore FinTech Festival 2025, highlighting its importance in the financial sector.
“You’re moving large amounts of money, so you need trust in the payment flows. You also need trust in the AI, the explainability. That’s where the policy question comes in. You’ve got the policy and the regulated entity, and if you can be the entity that connects innovation, trust, and compliance, that becomes the core of the system. That’s what we’re working on,” Benisti said.
Amira KarimAmazon’s head of public policy, payments and financial services agreed that trust is at the heart of everything, but one of the factors she wants to tie into trust is how data can be used to strengthen and improve that trust.
Karim said regulators and policymakers are often responsible for building trust across global trade networks.
“But can we leverage data and leverage new technologies to decentralize trust a little more? And I don’t mean just through DLT (distributed ledger technology), but the access and agency for someone, a small business, or an individual to understand what’s going on in the underlying infrastructure is very powerful,” Karim said.
Anju PatwardhanThe former banking executive, now an independent director at Gulf International Bank, said it’s difficult to build trust when banks are reluctant to share information and often can’t agree on what technology to use or how to proceed.
“You’re almost [always] We need an independent third party to build trust so we can collaborate and share information,” Patwardhan said.
Patwardhan said he has long wondered why there is no equivalent to a consumer credit bureau in the corporate world, noting that without a neutral and independent mechanism to share information, trade finance and corporate lending struggle to build the trust needed to thrive.
Kazuya IkedaSumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation’s Managing Executive Officer, Head of Transaction Business and AI Transformation, and Deputy General Manager of Global Business Unit agreed with all trade finance stakeholders that building unique and separate systems, especially those that cannot communicate with each other, is one of the biggest barriers to building trust.
“For example, blockchain. We have many blockchains, but these blockchains cannot communicate with each other. But if you can do it in a secure and reliable way, that is one solution,” Ikeda said.
Ikeda proposed building a global, trusted common network designed for blockchain, similar to SWIFT. He also suggested using tokenization to protect privacy, allowing sensitive data to be shared without revealing identity and processed by AI.
Benisti added to Ikeda’s point by pointing out that the interoperability he described is no longer theoretical, pointing to JPMorgan’s recent move to allow value to flow from a permissioned blockchain to a public chain where JPM coins can be exchanged for USDC. He argued that this type of secure cross-chain connection shows that the technology is ready, and that the real barriers now lie in policy, regulation, and banks’ confidence in using the technology.
Namrata Jolie, Microsoft’s Managing Director and Head of FSI Asia has shifted focus to the intelligence running on these systems. She emphasized that even if blockchain connectivity is largely solved, the broader ecosystem will not advance unless the AI itself is trustworthy.
From Microsoft’s vantage point, she emphasized the need for a responsible AI framework that protects fairness, trust, inclusiveness, and transparency across financial applications.
“If there is no trust, there is no adoption,” Joly said, noting that for regulators and customers to trust AI-powered decision-making, whether it is loan origination or risk assessment, it must be explainable and unbiased.
Sharing his thoughts on the future of finance, Karim said we need to move beyond connectivity because it is a “stake”.
“I think the future of finance is really about consistency. I think we need to make sure that the technologies have mechanisms in place to work together and develop not just a shared language to ensure collaboration, but common goals that align. So we move from connectivity to consistency through collaboration,” Karim said.
Patwardhan said the only item on his wish list for the next five to 10 years is the establishment of a central global or national authority that can coordinate responses to cyber and ransomware attacks, so that businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, do not have to deal with crises alone.
Patwardhan cited the time in October when Japanese beer maker Asahi suffered a cyber attack that disrupted operations and forced the closure of most of its plants.
“What I was thinking about is why do all businesses have to deal with this situation on their own? I think Singapore announced last month a legal framework or a central hotline that they will set up for small and medium-sized businesses, so if a small business suffers a cyber-attack, [they can get support]” said Patwardhan.
Mr. Ikeda concluded by highlighting both the scale and responsibility of AI’s role in modern trade.
“There are endless ways to leverage AI,” he said, noting that the challenge now is to deploy AI responsibly, which is why he has centralized all finance, insurance and AI functions under one team.
For Jolie, she sees great opportunity in public-private partnerships. “Public and private players can take advantage of the technological advancements that certain players are deploying and other players can adopt. They also have the ability to put in place consistent standards to help address these issues that we’re talking about,” she said.
Benisti, on the other hand, said he believes the payments will eventually become invisible. This means everything is completely on-chain, fully interoperable, and frictionless.
“For my customers and my end customers, it shouldn’t matter whether they’re using stablecoins or tokenized deposits or fiat currencies. They don’t even need to know. Payments are just the nervous system. Payments are just the root of it. What’s interesting is the data, the intelligence, and what you can do with it,” Benisti said.
