In 2025, total investment in fintech increased by 21%, totalling an incredible $53 billion.
Fintech has also been one of the biggest engines behind global unicorns, accounting for around 20-25% of them, showing that it is a huge driver of successful companies.
When it came to the fintech sectors leading the way, payments, online banking, compliance and AI seemed to steal the show.
What Were The Biggest Fintech Funding Rounds Of 2025?
One of the best ways to understand where the sector is heading is to look at the companies investors backed the most over the past 12 months.
In 2025, Binance had the biggest fintech funding round of 2025, raising a huge $2 billion in investment. This was followed by Polymarket ($2 billion), Kalshi ($1 billion) and Kraken ($800 million).
What Does 2026 Have In Store For Fintech?
According to insights by Taylor Wessing, in 2026, investors are going to be looking at profitability and compliance. Fintech as a sector has driven some huge funding rounds, but expansion and profitability can be difficult.
As a sector, finance is very heavily regulated, with different countries having different hoops for businesses to jump through. This can make expansion tricky and expensive, meaning it’s harder for these startups to generate real returns.
To find out what 2026 has in store for fintech, we decided to ask the experts. Here’s what they had to say…
Our Experts
- Alexander Goncharuk, Managing Director, UK, and Global Head of FSI at Intellias
- Serge Kuznetsov, Co-Founder at INXY Payments
- Azimkhon Askarov, Co-CEO & Partner at CONCRYT
- Philip Bruno, Chief Strategy and Growth Officer at ACI Worldwide
- Aaron Holmes, CEO at Kani Payments
- Livia Bernardini, CEO at Future Platforms
- Iain Armstrong, Executive Director, Financial Crime Compliance Strategy at ComplyAdvantage
- Michele Tucci, Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) and Co-Founder at Credolab
- Carlo Gualandri, Chief Executive Officer at Soldo
- Marco Venuti, IAM Business Acceleration Director at Thales
- Paul Gillooly, Director at Dot Dot Loans
- Arjun Kumar, Founder of Taxd
- Eleni Panagiotopoulou, Head of AML Team at SOFTSWISS
- Eduardo Crespo, VP EMEA at PagerDuty
- Ed Crook, VP Strategy & Operations at DeepL
- Jeppe Rindom, CEO and Co-Founder at Pleo
- Nick Merritt, Executive Director at Designit
- Niranjan Sapkota, Assistant Professor of Finance at University of Vaasa
- Andrew Leal, CEO and Founder at Waggel
- Tommaso Jacopo Ulissi, Head of Strategy and Transformation at Nexi Group
- Anish Kapoor, CEO at AccessPay
- Becki LaPorte, Principal, AML Strategy and Innovation at FinScan
- Ben Goldin, Founder and CEO at Plumery
- Brandon Spear, CEO at TreviPay
Alexander Goncharuk, Managing Director, UK, and Global Head of FSI at Intellias
“Financial services in 2026 will wrestle with agentic AI. Currently, most institutions utilise AI for specific tasks, like credit scoring or report writing. Agentic AI is different; it navigates through your data, makes decisions, and executes them. That could collapse workflows from weeks to days and make customer engagement genuinely personal.
“But here’s where financial institutions get stuck. First, your customer data sits across fragmented systems that don’t communicate. Second, most teams lack people who can build and operate these autonomous systems at scale.
“That’s where AIOps expertise comes in, and frankly, it’s in short supply. This isn’t just a hiring problem either. You need people to operate these systems on a day-to-day basis, troubleshoot when they malfunction, and adapt them as business needs change. Institutions that figure out how to upskill existing staff and integrate those data silos will have a real advantage. The ones that don’t will be stuck watching competitors move faster.”
Serge Kuznetsov, Co-Founder at INXY Payments
“In 2026, we’ll see two major shifts in FinTech driven by the convergence of stablecoins, consumer behaviour, and AI.
“First, stablecoin finance will scale rapidly beyond the crypto-native ecosystem and become woven into mainstream economic sectors. Adoption in digital commerce, gaming, and hospitality will continue to accelerate at a fast pace, fuelled by lower transaction costs, instant settlement, and global accessibility. However, more transformative development will take place in offline commerce. Large retailers will begin testing stablecoin payments at POS terminals, starting with pilot programs in selected locations and gradually expanding as operational and regulatory frameworks mature. It won’t be a speculative experiment — it will be driven by tangible gains in margin efficiency and reduced chargebacks.
“Second, 2026 will mark the emergence of AI agents that transact autonomously. Agents will not only book hotels, restaurants, or flights — they will execute payments, handle deposits, and manage refunds with minimal human intervention. This is where AI and blockchain intersect, as stablecoins are well-suited for machine-to-machine transactions. I expect several major pilots that validate the model and catalyse rapid growth. Ultimately, autonomous payments will push automation into daily life, unlocking a new level of convenience and operational efficiency for both consumers and businesses.”
Azimkhon Askarov, Co-CEO & Partner of Payments Company CONCRYT
“As we look ahead to 2026, the continued growth of non-cash transactions will reshape how merchants operate and compete. Mobile-first economies, expanding e-commerce, and the rise of real-time payment infrastructure are driving a global shift toward digital wallets and account-to-account payments. For merchants, this isn’t just about adding new payment options, it’s about rethinking how they build trust, scale globally, and deliver seamless customer experiences.
“At the same time, 2026 is shaping up to be a challenging year economically, with growing signals that a stock market correction or downturn could occur within the next 12 months. In this climate, merchants are likely to face tighter margins and more cautious consumers. That makes payment efficiency and liquidity management more critical than ever. Reliable cross-border payment flows, real-time settlement, and smarter cash flow visibility will help merchants remain resilient even as macroeconomic uncertainty rises.
“We’re also seeing a sharp evolution in merchant expectations. Small businesses are demanding faster, more secure, omnichannel payment solutions, while larger merchants are prioritising integration, automation, and personalisation to drive efficiency. The rapid digitisation of B2B payments is amplifying this shift, as business buyers expect the same simplicity and speed they experience in consumer commerce.
“In 2026, success for merchants won’t just depend on accepting payments, it will depend on how intelligently they can connect, protect, and optimise every transaction across channels and borders.”
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Philip Bruno, Chief Strategy and Growth Officer at ACI Worldwide
“Disruption will continue to dominate the global payments landscape in 2026. New digital asset rails – from stablecoins to tokenised deposits and CBDCs – are fast moving from concept to reality, embedded in regulated, interoperable systems. As these rails move into real-world use, the pace of change is set to accelerate, transforming cross-border value movement and expanding what’s possible in everyday payments.
“Banks and financial institutions that embrace a multi-rail approach – treating stablecoins, tokenised deposits and real-time payments as complementary – will be best positioned to orchestrate global payment flows. As these technologies move into the mainstream, regulators across the US, EU and beyond will create a more predictable environment with more consistent compliance frameworks, making flexible, interoperable infrastructure essential.”
Aaron Holmes, CEO, Kani Payments
“As we look ahead to 2026, the biggest opportunity for the payments industry lies in rebuilding and deepening consumer trust. The safeguarding regulation coming into force in May will push firms to adopt standards that many would agree should have been in place years ago.
“Too many electronic money and payments firms have been operating with processes that are barely adequate for protecting customer funds. All it would take is one major failure to set the industry back significantly. Strengthening back-office structures, tightening compliance frameworks and investing in leaner, more resilient operational models will be essential. Firms that get this right will stand apart, not just for meeting regulatory expectations but for demonstrating that they take their role in the financial ecosystem seriously.
“Alongside this, 2026 should mark a shift in how data is used and understood.
“There are important improvements on the horizon from the Bank of England and Mastercard that will change aspects of the transaction lifecycle. Real time monitoring and reconciliation will no longer be a nice to have but a baseline expectation. Faster and safer movement of funds will rely on better data, more automation and a willingness to modernise systems that have remained largely unchanged for too long. The firms that embrace these structural improvements will be in a far stronger position to innovate at the customer facing level. Those that do not risk being left behind in what is becoming a far more demanding environment.”
Livia Bernardini, CEO of Future Platforms
“London was a real sandbox of fintech innovation a decade ago. There was government support, the right legislation to help start-ups get going. The challenge we’re facing now is whether the same infrastructure is in place to help companies scale and become more established. We’re seeing companies make noises about getting to a certain size and then looking elsewhere to take that next step. Concerns around tax, around government support, are making businesses more cautious about staying in London and the UK, and I think 2026 will be a real tipping point for whether fintechs see the country as a place to stay and become the next industry unicorn, or relocate.
“In the broader Fintech market I think there’s going to be continued focus on underserviced and underleveraged audiences. The cost of living crisis isn’t a short term phase, and so we’re seeing more established FS brands look at how they can support their customers with areas such as budget management that they previously haven’t considered. It’s an opportunity for the industry to become more inclusive, to tap into those audiences that have perhaps previously not fit into the rigid boxes many institutions have for their customers.”
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Iain Armstrong, Financial Crime Compliance Strategy Executive Director at ComplyAdvantage
“The game of cat-and-mouse in financial crime is set to continue next year, under the umbrella of AI, as bad actors seek to exploit the technology for illicit gains, while financial services use it to scale their defences and outsmart criminals.
“It’s already had a significant impact on the landscape this year. AI-enabled financial crime has surged, exposing vulnerabilities in financial institutions caused by legacy systems which struggle to keep pace as criminals form increasingly sophisticated attacks, like automated social engineering, deepfakes or impersonation fraud.
“In 2026, banks will turn the odds back in their favour. They will remove compliance systems that were built for the flip-phone era and replace them with smart, scalable agentic systems – where AI is built-in, not bolted-on – that will soon become the industry standard. But they will need a skilled and empowered workforce to make this a success. Institutions should lean on industry experts, as well as regulators, to knowledge-share, form best practice in the new era of FinCrime prevention, and equip their compliance teams with the insight they need to keep bad actors out.”
Michele Tucci, Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) and Co-Founder at Credolab
“Looking ahead to 2026, AI is going to shape both the threat and the defense in the financial industry. Fraudsters will keep using generative and automated tools to scale up attacks and mimic users more convincingly. At the same time, financial institutions will rely on AI models that can read micro-behaviors, detect unusual patterns, and evaluate digital trust in real time. The companies that succeed will be the ones that bring identity, behavior, and device intelligence together into a single, adaptive view of trust. Fraud prevention is no longer a checkpoint. It is a continuous process that runs throughout the entire customer journey.
“The good news is that we are also seeing real progress. More financial institutions are moving toward privacy-preserving behavioral and device intelligence to understand how users interact, how consistent their device environment is, and whether their session actually makes sense. Combining identity verification with behavioral and device intelligence helps detect fraud risk a lot earlier than any ID or document check is even made, while keeping genuine customers moving through the journey without friction.”
Carlo Gualandri, Chief Executive Officer at Soldo
“In 2026, finance teams will face a new wave of AI-driven fraud, and the biggest mistake will be trying to outsmart it with old processes. AI-generated receipts are now so realistic that they can outsmart the human eye. The real shift next year will be a recognition that receipts, real or fake, are only ever a reflection of a payment. A receipt can be fabricated, but a payment can’t. So, the real “source of truth” lies in the payment trail, not in tell-tale signs of AI generation.
“Markets like Italy have already shown the direction of travel with regulations like Legge di Bilancio mandating traceable payments to curb tax evasion. The same logic, if applied globally, could help businesses eradicate AI-enabled fraud before it takes root.
“2026 must be the year that businesses move from manual checks and retrospective policing, to a proactive approach, built on real-time verification and transparent, auditable digital spend.”
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Marco Venuti, Identity and Access Management Business Acceleration Director at Thales
“Payment passkeys will redefine online checkout. In 2026, passkeys will finally make their mark in the payment’s world. The cumbersome security steps that slow online checkouts – copying one-time codes, redirecting through 3D Secure pages – will give way to payment passkeys. This shift will streamline the purchasing experience while cutting fraud, as banks and merchants move away from vulnerable password-based systems. The change will also be regulatory as much as technical, with liability for fraud expected to fall more heavily on organisations that fail to deploy stronger authentication. For consumers, the result will be faster, simpler, and safer online payments.”
Paul Gillooly, Director at Dot Dot Loans
“2026- FinTech willevolve to be more towards hyper-personalised financial tools, especially for the non-prime customers. AI will enable affordability checks and spending data that extends beyond legacy credit scores, unlocking financial services for individuals outside of mainstream finance.
“We will see more ethical lending platforms that incorporate open banking data for offering fairer terms based on the real-time cash flows, rather than just inflexible credit histories. By Dot Dot Loans, we’ve already seen the effect of this change on those with limited credit files.
“I also anticipate the rise of regulatory tech (“RegTech”), which will help lenders remain compliant while still being innovators. The challenge will be managing risk, transparency and access, at least while cost of living pressures endure.
“FinTech’s next frontier won’t be about gadgets as much as gaining trust from those who have long felt abandoned by the system.”
Arjun Kumar, Founder of Taxd
“In 2026, we will see fintechs moving away from “growth-at-all-costs” strategies, investing huge amounts of cash for enormous growth. Instead, we will see a move towards sustainable growth and retention. Underpinning this is a shift in the investment landscape following a period of cheap, easy capital.
“Investors will no longer be impressed by vanity metrics like rapidly increasing sign-ups. They will be more risk-averse and will be looking for longevity in their investments. Before putting their hand in their pockets, investors will be looking for a clear growth path, strong unit economics (showing that each customer has value) and a low burn rate. If a company is going to splash the cash needlessly without driving profitability, investors will likely look elsewhere.
“This trend will be particularly prominent in the UK. Because of tax increases, investors will likely be even more cautious and will only be willing to invest in companies that can offer more certainty on return on investment. Otherwise, they may look to spend overseas in lower tax regions like the Middle East.”
Eleni Panagiotopoulou, Head of the the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Team at SOFTSWISS
“Online businesses, especially those operating globally, will remain under pressure to offer a wider array of payment options to localise their offering and cater to customers’ changing needs in order to stay competitive. I believe that this trend is going to intensify over the course of 2026 with the rise of alternative payment methods, and growing popularity of crypto payments — and fintechs will need to cater for this.
“While adopting additional payment methods helps online businesses reach new customers, it also carries lots of complexity, including in terms of regulatory compliance, which is getting more and more costly. At the same time, improvements in AI are making fraud and money laundering easier for criminals to conduct, helping make their schemes more sophisticated.
“This means that 2026 will be the year when all fintechs will need to beef up the cybersecurity and anti-money laundering measures built into their products, making sure they stay one step ahead of the criminals to withstand the tech-enabled threats of the future.’’
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Eduardo Crespo, VP EMEA at PagerDuty
“By 2026, financial services firms have turned hard-won lessons from the Treasury’s 2025 outage reports into action. Years of costly downtime and lost trust pushed the industry to rebuild around resilience. Always-on access is non-negotiable. Customers leave if they can’t transact in real time, and regulators are watching. In response, banks are overhauling legacy stacks and embedding AI at the core of incident management.
“AI isn’t a pilot project anymore, it’s become part of frontline defence. Systems now detect and diagnose disruption before it happens, enabling predictive maintenance and softening the blow of unplanned events. In 2026, resilience is a competitive edge”
Ed Crook, VP Strategy & Operations, DeepL
“2026 will be make-or-break for many financial services providers. In a competitive market, the edge goes to providers who adopt useful AI to cut through inefficient workflows. In this sector, where every interaction is highly regulated and reputational risk is acute, businesses need the right tools for the job. This includes data protection, account security, compliance, IT ops and customer service – keeping fundamental lines of communication open and effective. These are all areas where AI is already solving critical problems.
“AI is fast becoming the connective tissue of international finance, and this trend will continue in 2026, particularly in customer engagement and operational support. Our FS research found that over a third (37%) of client interactions in UK finance already involve AI. Over half (52%) use AI for multilingual translation, the top use case, directly addressing linguistic fragmentation. Moving into the new year, Language AI will be a key practical tool for financial services firms.
“But these companies first need to iron out their strategy around AI integration. Staff will inevitably look for workarounds if the tools provided don’t meet their needs. This is why companies need to get ahead by providing secure, fit-for-purpose solutions. By building a collaborative approach between IT and frontline teams, and avoiding pitfalls around shadow AI, financial service firms can maintain a unified, strategy approach to AI deployment, protecting against cybersecurity threats, while still realising the full benefits of trusted AI.”
Jeppe Rindom, CEO and Co-Founder at Pleo
“Automation and “agentification” will redefine the fintech landscape. Most of what’s considered operational today will be handled by intelligent systems, from finance ops to customer support. That playing field will level and expectations will rise.
“To stand out, companies will need to inject identity – the one thing only humans can create. That could be through exceptional product design and user experience, considered use of human touchpoints where emotion and trust matter most, or the depth in which problems are solved for customers, not just how fast they can be solved.
“As the average becomes automated, greatness will come from creativity, clarity and crafting products and experiences that still feel unmistakably human.”
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Nick Merritt, Executive Director at Designit
“The next wave of digital transformation in financial services will be shaped less by technology and more by oversight. As AI becomes embedded in lending, risk modelling, and fraud detection, regulators will begin treating algorithms and model providers as part of the financial system’s critical infrastructure.
“Institutions will be expected to prove not only that models are effective, but that they are fair, explainable, and traceable. The PRA and FCA will tighten expectations on model risk governance, auditability, and accountability for third-party vendors. This will drive a new wave of investment in what might be called “governance technology” – systems that log, monitor, and validate model behaviour.
“It will feel, at times, like the fun has been taken out of innovation. But in truth, this is the moment where discipline separates genuine advantage from hype.
“Compliance will evolve from a cost centre to a competitive advantage. Institutions that can evidence trust will grow fastest.”
Niranjan Sapkota, Assistant Professor of Finance (Tenure Track) at University of Vaasa, Finland
“As a researcher in FinTech, I see 2026 defined by a fundamental paradox where services become radically accessible while trust becomes exponentially harder to establish. AI-driven personalization reaches unprecedented sophistication with robo-advisors using behavioral pattern recognition, embedded finance dissolving into invisible transactions, and real-time credit decisions analyzing conversational cues through Natural Language Processing.
“Unfortunately, incidents like the Arup $25 million deepfake scam preview our reality. Generative AI will make fraud indistinguishable from legitimacy, forcing institutions toward multi-modal biometric authentication, behavioral analytics, and continuous verification. Regulators will demand explainability in AI credit decisions, scrutinizing algorithmic bias.
“CBDCs move from pilot to limited deployment, though cross-border payment challenges remain significant. Crypto enters a maturity phase under the EU’s MiCA regulation, driving institutional adoption while creating a clear separation between compliant crypto and experimental DeFi. The 2026 FIFA World Cup will unleash illegal decentralized crypto betting at an unprecedented scale, given that over £1.5 billion was staked during Qatar 2022 in the UK alone.
“Quantum-safe cryptographic protocols might enter early deployment in some developed countries to protect valuable data against future quantum threats. At the same time, developing nations face dangerous complexity as FinTech innovation races ahead while digital literacy lags severely behind.”
Andrew Leal, CEO and Founder of Waggel
“For Fintech businesses, I think 2026 is going to be the year AI goes from a testing phase to making a real impact. After years of pilots and experiments, intelligent automation is finally mature enough to speed up processes, cut through complexity, and make service feel more personal, not less.
“In insurance we’re starting to see AI agents that can analyse claims data, spot patterns, and handle much of the routine work, freeing human teams to focus on the parts of the job that actually require empathy and judgement. As a result, companies like ours are investing heavily in better data systems so AI can work reliably, as well as helping staff build the skills to collaborate with these tools rather than feel threatened by them.
“The benefits will be 24/7 support, faster access to information, and more consistent service. Agent assist tools can guide team members, flag missing details, and suggest next steps based on past outcomes.
“However, if a chatbot gives the wrong answer, or interactions feel cold and automated, that can erode trust quickly, especially in sensitive moments like insurance claims. The success stories for 2026 will be those businesses using AI to support humans, not replace them – with strong oversight, clear escalation paths, and a focus on keeping service genuinely human.
“For consumers, I think AIs such as Chatgpt will start to understand their user better and become more integrated in people’s lives. That will mean that people will rely on it to shop around, and, given the level of personalisation on offer, comparison websites might not be the first place people go to look for financial related products.”
Brandon Spear, CEO of TreviPay
“Over the past few years, businesses have accelerated digitization, automation, and global scaling, yet in many cases, B2B payments remain largely manual. However, in 2025, we can finally see payments becoming embedded, intelligent, and proactive. That’s a shift that is fundamentally transforming how businesses buy, sell, and manage cash.”
“The most important innovations in e-commerce won’t be about faster checkout buttons or sleeker portals, but about making payments so seamless that buyers hardly notice them. Welcome to the age of invisible payments where processing transactions no longer disrupts workflows or impacts customer satisfaction. Gradually, and across the board, payments will stop being a separate step and instead operate invisibly, integrated directly into the systems and workflows businesses already use.
“Here I’m thinking of the observation by IDC’s Kevin Permenter, who notes that we will soon need to visualize POs that, once approved, automatically trigger instant payments, or hitting a project milestone that effortlessly releases funds. As he says, ‘This level of embeddedness is blurring the lines between operations and financial transactions. It’s a game-changer.’
“The data backs him up and confirms the momentum: driven by open APIs, ERP integration, and customer demand for zero-touch, seamless experiences, the invisible-payments market is projected to grow at an 18.2% CAGR, surpassing $2.27 trillion by 2034. In practice, this could mean reconciliation disappearing as workflows and payments merge, cash cycles accelerating with funds released instantly upon predefined triggers, and—perhaps most importantly for your CEO—ease of buying becoming a strategic advantage, not only a convenience.
“The takeaway for CFOs, CPOs, and B2B payments leaders is clear: if you still view payments as a standalone back-office function, you’re already behind. Embedded finance will soon be an expectation, not a differentiator—and the businesses that adopt invisible payments now will set the benchmark for efficiency and customer experience not just in 2026, but throughout the rest of the decade.”
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