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Digital assets lead 26% of APAC cross-border payment discussions

Digital currencies, stablecoins, and tokenization are leading cross-border payment topics in Asia, appearing in 26% of discussions in more than 1,000 industry articles reviewed over the past year. QR code and wallet connectivity ranked second at 24% share, according to Money 20/20 and the FXC Intelligence’s The New Era of Asia’s Cross-Border Payments report. The report’s coverage focused on retail payment systems working in different countries, particularly on QR code networks and digital wallets. While national real-time payment links accounted for 19% of the discussion, remittances and financial inclusion accounted for 13%, artificial intelligence (AI) accounted for 9%, and local currency settlement accounted for 7%.

The findings indicate that the main priorities for cross-border payments in 2026 include enhancing interoperability between payment systems, increasing adoption of digital payment technologies, and reducing the costs and complexities of cross-border transactions. In terms of regional adoption, the FXC Intelligence report revealed that cross-border payments have been gaining positive sentiment in the Asia-Pacific region over the past year. They said that almost two-thirds of the reviews had a positive tone, while 13% were largely negative, and 25% remained neutral. Hong Kong recorded the highest share of positive articles at 69%, with only 9% negative, followed by Thailand at 67%, then China and India, each at 66%. Japan recorded the highest negative sentiment at 19%, followed by Vietnam at 17%, and the Philippines at 16%.

In addition, the report indicated that outbound retail cross-border payments from the APAC region reach $13.5 trillion in 2025, representing 31% of global outflows. The majority of this transaction volume came from business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) payments, which together accounted for 83% of total flows. In comparison, consumer-to-consumer and consumer-to-business transactions accounted for the remaining 17%, with distribution slightly below the global average of 84% of B2B and B2C payments.

Looking ahead, APAC’s cross-border payment volume is projected to outpace the global average, with the market expected to reach $24 trillion by 2033. By this period, APAC is anticipated to contribute 36% of global outbound flows and account for 35% of B2B and B2C payment activities. Key contributors to the region’s payment volume growth include trade and supply chain dynamics, particularly B2B payments for goods.

Increased demand for overseas software and services, a rise in online retail and cross-border shopping, and a boost in international tourism, especially in the Southeast Asian market, were also cited as contributing to this growth. Digital payments developments in Asia so far

Digital payments have been gaining traction in Asia over the past few years. In 2025, digital payments in the South Asian countries of Pakistan and India have surged. The Reserve Bank of India disclosed in November that digital payments comprised 99.8% of total transaction volume in the first half of the year, while the country’s Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system raked in 69% of the total value of digital payments while accounting for only 0.1% in terms of volume. In Pakistan,  » …

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Carla Contass

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