🌟 Editor's note

Editor’s Note | Week of 1 September 2025

Welcome to the Trade Treasury Payments (TTP) weekly newsletter. For those new subscribers, here’s a reintroduction of our mission.

TTP is a rapidly growing multimedia and education platform, delivering real-time market insights across liquidity and risk management.

We are truly independent and impartial, funded openly through advertising, sponsorships, and our media/communications white-label agency business.

Seven multilateral development banks and global trade organisations support us, and we are governed by a 9-person editorial board and a 56‑person Global Advisory Panel (GAP).

This integrity matters, especially amid currents of geopolitical realignment and financial fragmentation.

This week’s special Asia Pacific edition is brought to you from Singapore, host of a multitude of trade and transaction banking events.

Until next week,

– Deepesh, Eleanor, Joy, Carter

Table of Contents

• Focus read

• Asia Pacific’s ascent—and its uneven terrain

• What happened this week in trade, treasury and pay …

  • Trade digest

  • Treasury and payments digest

  • 🗓️ Upcoming events

  • Multimedia from Trade Treasury Payments

    • Videos

Focus read

Asia Pacific’s ascent—and its uneven terrain

Fifteen years ago, China’s economy was roughly two-and-a-half times smaller than America’s in nominal terms (about US$6.1tn vs US$15.0tn in 2010). 

Today, that gap has narrowed markedly, even as trend growth moderates. 

Across the wider region, developing Asia is still the world’s growth engine: the Asian Development Bank (ADB) projects ~4.8% regional growth in 2025–26, even after tariff shocks and a choppy global cycle. 

Several of the fastest-growing mid-size economies in the world this year and next are here: Viet Nam, the Philippines, Cambodia, Mongolia and Uzbekistan are all forecast to expand briskly.  

But growth is not a synonym for stability. 

The region’s political and economic terrain remains jagged. Sri Lanka is still emerging from sovereign default. Bangladesh is under an IMF programme with growth and inflation pressures in flux. Myanmar remains diplomatically isolated, and Cambodia, Pakistan, and Papua New Guinea are navigating the uncomfortable trade-off between external debt and infrastructure-led growth. 

Meanwhile, intensifying heatwaves, typhoons, and crop disruption threaten to undermine even the most robust growth projections.

Asia is integrating. On its own terms.

To continue the theme, we thought we’d reflect on some of our recent liquidity and risk management coverage in the Asia Pacific region.

Perhaps useful for polite small talk during networking breaks, or, if you’re getting your talking points ready for delivery of your killer conference panel. Here are our top 12:

What happened this week in trade, treasury and payments?

Trade digest

#TTPulse: Chinese fintech Linklogis teams up with XRP Ledger to advance digital trade finance

🔸Shenzhen-based fintech Linklogis has partnered with XRP Ledger (XRPL) to develop innovative digital applications for supply-chain finance, integrating its existing solutions with the XRPL mainnet.

#TTPulse: Invoice financing manipulation at the core of Anil Ambani bank fraud investigation

🔸The Central Bureau Of Investigation. (CBI) India has conducted searches at premises linked to Anil Ambani, once among Asia's wealthiest business leaders and brother to India's richest man, Mukesh Ambani, in connection with an alleged ₹2,929 crore ($350 million) bank fraud case.

#TTPulse: Haycen receives stablecoin issuance license from Bermuda for cross-border trade finance 🪙

🔸Trade financing company Haycen has obtained a Digital Asset Business (M) license from the Bermuda Monetary Authority, allowing it to issue and manage collateralised stablecoins in multiple currencies, including a British pound-denominated token.

🔸Haycen's stablecoins will be fully collateralised at all times, addressing a segment of trade finance that remains largely underserved by traditional banks despite its significant market size. Haycen enters a stablecoin market currently dominated by USDT and USDC, with a combined market cap of about $280 billion.

#TTPulse: African leaders map strategy from raw exports to value addition at London forum

🔸GHIB- Ghana International Bank's flagship conference, GHIBCONVERGE 2025, wrapped up last week in London with a clear message that Africa must swiftly transition from exporting raw materials to trading processed goods.

🔸GHIB CEO Dean Adansi emphasised that merely 14% of Africa's exports are manufactured products, a statistic unchanged for decades. He pointed out the untapped billions lost because Africa exports raw cocoa instead of chocolate, raw gold instead of refined bullion.

#TTPulse: Zenith Group Advisors rolls out expanded supply chain finance program for PE portfolio companies

🔸Zenith Group Advisors has announced an expansion of its supply chain finance program specifically designed to address the unique challenges faced by private equity-backed companies.

Treasury and payments digest

#TTPulse: Klarna secures €1.4 billion financing from Santander to fuel growth 📈

🔸Swedish fintech Klarna has established a €1.4 billion structured financing facility with Santander, marking its first warehouse line with the Spanish banking giant.

🔸 The facility, backed by German receivables, will enable more efficient capital recycling across Klarna's short-term lending products.

#TTPulse: Financial Action Task Force (FATF) tightens virtual asset "Travel Rule" with expanded cross-border payment requirements

🔸The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has published updates to its Recommendation 16, known as the "Travel Rule," establishing stricter requirements for information accompanying cross-border payments and virtual asset transfers.

#TTPulse: Fintech leader Haball secures regulatory approval to revolutionise B2B payments in Pakistan

🔸Pakistan's largest non-banking corporate aggregator, Haball, has secured in-principle approval from the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) for a Payment System Operator/Payment Service Provider (PSO/PSP) license, complementing their earlier Payment Initiation Service Provider (PISP) authorisation.

#TTPulse: Finastra and Circle join hands to revolutionise cross-border payments with USDC settlement

🔸Financial software company Finastra has announced a partnership with stablecoin leader Circle to integrate USDC settlement directly into cross-border payment flows, enabling banks to access blockchain-based settlement without the need to build a standalone infrastructure.

🗓️ Upcoming events

Featured events by TTP

Partner events

Multimedia from Trade Treasury Payments

Videos

Did You Know? Asia Pacific’s developing economies are still the world’s growth engine, with ADB projecting ~4.8% GDP growth in 2025–26, despite global headwinds. Viet Nam, Mongolia, and Uzbekistan are leading the charge.

Till next time,

Trade Treasury Payments (TTP)