Thursday, 06 June, 2024
2:00 PM GST | 12:00 PM SAST

Diversifying Cross-border Payments for Growth

Cross border business generates a big portion of banks' revenues, but competition has made the margins relatively smaller.

In partnership with

Why attend

The banks look at diversifying their cross-border business with multiple options to settle transactions, global networks SWIFT are still the most reliable but expensive at scale. SWIFT has been leading the initiative to modernize its financial messaging standards and creating what they call CBPR+ (cross-border payments and reporting), banks must comply at all levels by November 2025. SWIFT also offers services such as SWIFT GPI to improve on issues such as transparency and speed of payment settlement. Then there are alternate rails, offered by fintechs, that improve margin opportunities and global reach for banks.

Away from the realm of optimizing the existing cross-order payments infrastructure, are the advancements in blockchain networks and tokenization of assets and the use of regulated and unregulated digital currencies. With applications in retail and corporate banking, banks are looking for a way in, and the first step seems to be a solution for interoperability between fiat and token-based transactions.

In this exclusive webinar, "Diversifying Cross-border Payments for Growth,” Temenos specialists, alongside a panel of seasoned industry leaders, discuss the key regulations and trends driving the cross-border payments business across MEA and offer insights and practical advice on how to implement these regulations most effectively.

The key take-aways

Understanding the Landscape: Gain a comprehensive understanding of the current cross-border payments landscape, including the dominance of SWIFT networks, their modernization efforts through CBPR+, and the emergence of alternative fintech solutions.

Navigating Regulatory Compliance: Learn about the critical regulatory deadlines, such as the November 2025 compliance mandate for CBPR+, and gain insights into how to navigate these regulations effectively to avoid penalties and ensure seamless operations.

Exploring Fintech Solutions: Discover the potential of fintech solutions in enhancing margin opportunities and expanding global reach for banks, providing viable alternatives to traditional SWIFT networks and offering improvements in transparency and speed of payment settlement.

Embracing Blockchain and Tokenization: Explore advancements in blockchain networks and asset tokenization, exploring their application in retail and corporate banking. Viewers will learn about the potential benefits and challenges of integrating these technologies into existing infrastructures, with a focus on achieving interoperability between fiat and token-based transactions.

The webinar panel

Click to view full speaker details

Shaheen Budhrani, Global Partnerships Director | THUNES

Shaheen is the Global Strategic Partnerships Lead at Thunes, a leading cross-border payments network backed by Insight Partners, Checkout.com, Visa and other Tier 1 investors. He has over 10 years of experience in global B2B sales and partnerships, across fintech, payments, accounting software, and hospitality industries.

Shaheen is responsible for executing the channel sales strategy for Thunes globally, working with key ecosystem partners within core banking, BaaS, treasury management and payment orchestration. He has a proven track record of success in negotiating commercial agreements and managing the full lifecycle of partner relationships. He has lead cross-functional teams and developed and documented playbooks for partnerships. He holds an MSc in Development Studies from the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Fernando Pacheco, Global Head of Cash Management Product | MASHREQ CORPORATE & INVESTMENT BANKING GROUP

25+ year career in financial services spanning Europe, Latin America, Asia Pacific, and Middle East, with a track record of building fast-growing businesses across Payments, Foreign Exchange, and Securities Lending for a number of organisations.

Fernando delivers a combination of an entrepreneurial mindset, passion for coaching and developing high-performance teams, track record of executing both strategic and tactical plans across complex multinational organisations, securing marquee client mandates, and a deep understanding of the end-to-end business across Sales, Operations, Product, Risk & Governance.

Ruhling Herbst, Executive Head: Africa Business Development | BANKSERVAFRICA

Ruhling Herbst joined BankservAfrica in 2016, he played an instrumental role in industry-led research programmes and initiating strategic initiatives, such as the Rapid Payments Programme and the African Regional Cross-border and Regional Payments Hub programmes. Ruhling is responsible for leading BankservAfrica’s growth efforts across the border and spearheading the implementation of a low value, cross border payment scheme and operations in the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

Alaa Al Rousan, Regional Account Director | SWIFT

Alaa Al Rousan is a Regional Account Director for SWIFT in the Middle East. He is responsible for driving SWIFT’s initiatives in the region and working with banking communities and regulators to provide solutions to regional industry challenges such as payments innovation, operational excellence and cyber security.

Alaa specializes in payments solutions design, financial messaging, RTGS, ACH and instant payment networks. Alaa has been with SWIFT for more than nine years, during which he has held the positions of Technical Expert & Solution Designer for the Middle East, Turkey & Africa, and Country Manager of some of the largest markets in the region. Prior to joining SWIFT, he worked in consulting and project management roles across the financial services industry. Alaa holds an MBA degree from Bayes Business School and an Engineering degree in Computers & Control Systems.

Ajay Singh Pundir, Business Development Director, Payments, MEA & APAC | TEMENOS

Ajay, in his role at Temenos, is responsible for growth of the Payments business across Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific.

Ajay also runs Econwired, a research website with a focus on financial tech strategy, based in Dubai. Over the last decade and half, Ajay has acquired experience across ‘Business Strategy’, ‘Sales management’, ' Business Development’, ‘Solution Consulting’ and ‘Research and Development’. He has been leading interactions with financial institutions, fintechs, software vendors and services organizations globally, acquiring crucial global exposure of varied facets of the financial technology market with a focus on payments but not limited to it.

Ajay has been active with financial institutions and financial technology corporations across multiple regions including Middle East (UAE, KSA, Egypt, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar), Africa (South Africa, Nigeria, SADC), Asia Pacific (Vietnam, Australia, Hong Kong, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan), Americas and LATAM (USA, Canada, Mexico), Europe and United Kingdom.

Download the Webinar

This webinar is in partnership with

We constantly innovate to combine rich, out-of-the-box functionality with cutting-edge technology. Our single code base means every dollar we invest benefits all our customers. We help our clients create new growth opportunities, drive efficiencies at scale and achieve cost-to-income ratios at half the industry average. We do this by offering open, composable, cloud-based banking services at a fraction of the cost of legacy systems.

Learn More

Anchor 1