The Asian Banker Weekly Brief: China expands currency swaps with Malaysia and Argentina, Singapore banks grow fee income as margins narrow, Westpac mortgage applications fall 20% and MUFG's profit rises 48%.

DBS sees growth opportunities across Asian capital markets, wealth and intra-Asian trade, with Taiwan and India among its key markets as technology and AI help scale its regional franchise.

Europe’s largest banks by country showed surprising resilience in the first half of 2026, with broad-based growth across their business segments. UBS, Barclays and BNP Paribas stood out, although part of their results were boosted by corporate-centre gains, treasury performance and exceptional items. Strong earnings prompted several banks to raise their full-year guidance and reconsider mergers and acquisitions

Financial Markets Weekly: Intercontinental Exchange agrees $5.7 billion MarketAxess acquisition as BlackRock expands tokenised money-market fund access in Europe via JPMorgan's Kinexys platform.

RHB PAY brings payment acceptance, settlement and reconciliation under the bank's control as RHB seeks to capture more merchant transaction flows and deepen its transaction-banking relationships.

Retail Finance Weekly: HSBC exits Australian and Egyptian retail banking through sales to Blackstone and Emirates NBD, while Visa agrees to acquire BioCatch for $2.4 billion to strengthen fraud defences.

TAB Africa Weekly Brief: CRDB Bank posts a 20.3% profit rise as Nedbank advances its NCBA Group acquisition and S&P Global agrees to buy a majority stake in Agusto & Co.

As Thai businesses shift further from cash and cheques into electronic payments, Krungthai Bank is using virtual accounts to address a problem that digital payments alone do not solve: how companies identify, reconcile and control money once it arrives.

Data from 25 of the world’s largest banks by assets across regions shows that leading institutions are not only accelerating existing work but also building the capacity to serve more customers, process higher volumes of activity and grow revenue without increasing resources at the same pace.

As foreign exchange (FX) markets fragment across platforms, currencies and regulatory regimes, Kasikornbank is expanding its FX and capital markets proposition through digital channels that connect FX services with business banking, trade finance and treasury workflows. These channels unify pricing, distribution and post-trade workflows for corporates, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and financial institutions.

TAB Middle East Weekly Brief: Emirates NBD moved to acquire HSBC Egypt's retail banking business, UAE banking assets climbed to $1.53 trillion and Mashreq posted an 18% rise in first-half pre-tax profit.

Transaction Finance Weekly: Citi's new trade-finance platform, Lloyds' tokenised-deposit transactions through Project Agorá and Wise's direct connection to Malaysia's PayNet network.

International trade is steadily shifting from documentary trade towards open account trading, requiring banks to rethink how they assess risk and deliver financing. Runa Baksi explained how HSBC is redesigning trade finance around trusted commercial data, embedded finance and new digital operating models while preserving established risk principles.

Risk and Capital Weekly Brief: HKMA's new Quantum Preparedness Index shows early-stage readiness at Hong Kong banks, while Lombard Odier faces a CHF 3 million AML fine.

The Asian Banker Weekly Brief: Japan and the US jointly intervened to support the yen after the Bank of Japan held rates, as Standard Chartered raised guidance and China accelerated policy support.