Authorities will examine origination, mobilisation and recycling of capital while seeking to attract regional companies and technology startups to raise funds through Singapore.

Simon Baptist, principal economist for APAC at Visa, examined how cross-border mobility, digital commerce and artificial intelligence investment are reshaping consumption patterns across the region.

Chocolate Finance’s founder Walter de Oude, and chief investment officer Benjamin Tan, set out how an asset-management led capital structure, disciplined fixed income construction and selective use of AI support simple, low-volatility savings and investment propositions for everyday customers seeking dependable returns without added complexity.

DBS’ 2025 results show income increasingly generated from customer activity rather than credit intermediation. Deposits, advisory distribution, settlement currencies and ecosystem financing now interact as a continuous operating cycle, indicating a structural transition in how the bank produces earnings.

Kevin Shum, head, digital SME, business transformation and merchant acquiring, group business and transaction banking at Alliance Bank Malaysia, set out how the bank is scaling a “Digital SME” business with bank-statement-led underwriting, faster approvals and targeted programmes to help smaller firms improve credit readiness while keeping losses within defined limits.

Ryan Fung, deputy chief executive and chief of retail and digital strategy, and Eric Fan, senior executive vice president and head of digital transformation at Shanghai Commercial Bank, explain how the bank is reshaping its SME operating model through shared data infrastructure, controlled AI deployment and tokenised settlement initiatives—positioning wealth growth as the outcome of an integrated client relationship that reduces friction and improves operating economics.

JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America lead large-bank revenue per employee rankings, while mid-tier banks such as First Abu Dhabi Bank and Saudi Awwal Bank report higher overall productivity levels, supported by focused business models, digital adoption and cost discipline.

SPDB was awarded two major accolades at the 2025 Global Wealth & Society Awards: Family Succession Service of the Year in China and Best Private Bank for Cross-border Wealth and Business Structuring in China.

Annie Chen, deputy chief executive of China Construction Bank (Asia) (CCB (Asia)), explained how the bank manages its Hong Kong retail and wealth management business, as customer needs increasingly span the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) including Guangdong, Shenzhen and other parts of the Mainland. Growth is shaped by fee-based wealth activity, digital execution and tightly governed product sequencing, rather than balance-sheet expansion alone.

Alliance Bank Malaysia is reworking its consumer lending economics by embedding credit products into partner ecosystems such as e-wallets and e-commerce platforms/apps, supported by a unified loan origination architecture designed to deliver a faster approval turnaround time.

Global banking enters 2026 with strong capital positions and easing financial conditions but faces a structurally more constrained environment shaped by slower growth, rising fiscal pressure, geopolitical fragmentation, evolving trade and payment corridors, shifting currency dynamics, deeper market-based intermediation and the accelerating impact of digitalisation

Woon Siew Hoong, Head of SME Banking at Hong Leong Bank explained how the bank’s SME franchise delivered resilient performance in 2025 by focusing strategically on micro and small businesses, applying relationship-managed discretionary credit, and embedding SME banking within a whole-bank operating model spanning retail, commercial, corporate and institutional banking.

Chinese and US megabanks generate the largest absolute profits through scale and diversification, while emerging-market banks deliver higher — but more volatile — returns on equity.

Stephen Man, Head of Wealth and Retail Banking at Standard Chartered Hong Kong, explains how the bank’s retail strategy is centred on affluent-led growth, a hybrid digital–advisory operating model and a disciplined approach to innovation, balancing scale, productivity and governance in a complex market environment.

As wallets, instant payments and embedded finance reshape how customers interact with payments across Asia Pacific, card issuance is often assumed to be losing relevance. David Lim of Alliance Bank Malaysia, Anshul Sabherwal of Standard Chartered and Andrew Murray of FIS examine how issuance is being repositioned to support credit, control and engagement in a wallet-first payments ecosystem.