Hey, fintech fam! 💜

Last week, I had the privilege of moderating Convera Live for Financial Institutions in NYC — a powerhouse panel that unpacked one of the most misunderstood (and fastest-evolving) corners of fintech: cross-border payments.

This week, I’m breaking it all down — with my full event recap, exclusive insights from industry leaders, and what it all means for fintech’s next era.

And speaking of global money movement… 🌍

Join Fintech Is Femme and our partners at the Lakeview Penthouse of the Bellagio during Money20/20 for our Growing Global Breakfast + Networking session on October 28.

I’m so inspired by the global fintech ecosystem we’re building together — and wanted to create a space for founders, operators, and investors driving innovation across borders to connect IRL.

RSVP here to save your seat.

Ready? Let’s get into it.

INNOVATION

Cross-Border Payments Unlocked: How Trust, Tech, and Compliance Are Redefining Global Finance

The conversations that shape the future of money rarely happen in quiet rooms.

They happen where energy meets expertise — like it did in New York City at Convera Live for Financial Institutions, an evening dedicated to unpacking one of finance’s most complex and consequential challenges: cross-border payments.

The event, Cross-Border Payments Unlocked: Innovation, Compliance, and Customer Impact, brought together an incredible panel of leaders:

• Joe Higginson, Head of Financial Institutions at Convera

• Judie Rinearson, Partner, Payments Group Leader at K&L Gates

• Kevin O’Neil, Account Director at SWIFT

• Drew Sullivan, VP at MAX Credit Union

I had the honor of moderating the conversation at Fintech Meetup HQ, in partnership with NYPAY, and what struck me wasn’t just the technical expertise on stage — it was the sense of urgency.

Because behind the trillion-dollar figures and regulatory frameworks, this is ultimately a story about trust: between institutions, between systems, and between people.

Setting the Scene: The Scale of What’s at Stake

By 2030, global cross-border payments are projected to surpass $290 trillion, with B2B transactions alone representing a $56 trillion opportunity.

Half of all SMBs are already doing more business internationally than they were just three years ago. By 2032, the SMB cross-border market is expected to hit $21 trillion.

Those numbers come straight from Convera’s Payments Pulse Report, which highlights how cross-border transactions have become the lifeblood of modern economies.

But behind those figures are the real stories — founders expanding globally, small businesses hiring across borders, consumers demanding instant settlement and transparent FX rates, and institutions racing to modernize their infrastructures.

And that’s where this conversation began: how financial institutions are navigating the intersection of innovation, compliance, and customer impact.

The Shift: From Competition to Collaboration

I started with Joe Higginson, Head of Financial Institutions at Convera, because Convera sits at the crossroads of it all — powering global payments for thousands of banks, credit unions, and fintechs.

“Convera’s Payments Reports show how smaller FIs are increasingly turning to partnerships to navigate the complexity of cross-border payments,” I asked. “What’s changed most in how they’re thinking about this space?”

Higginson smiled — he’s spent his career helping financial institutions adapt to this exact moment.

“You can think of it as a choose-your-own-adventure model,” he said. “Some clients want to connect directly, others prefer to partner. We’re about interoperability — meeting customers where they are. And ultimately, it’s about growth. We want to be where our customers need to be.”

The word interoperability became a recurring theme of the night. It’s often said, but it represents a mindset shift.

Partnerships aren’t just a strategy anymore — they’re infrastructure.

For regional and community banks, that’s particularly true. As Convera’s Payments Pulse Report outlines, these institutions are uniquely positioned to thrive in cross-border markets because of their deep local roots.

“They’re not just account numbers,” Higginson told me. “They’re neighbors. That local connection matters — and it’s a competitive advantage.”

Myth vs. Reality: Cross-Border Speed Isn’t the Problem

Next, I turned to Kevin O’Neil, Account Director at SWIFT, to address the question everyone thinks they already know the answer to:

“Why do cross-border payments still take days?”

O’Neil laughed, then turned it into a teachable moment.

“Forty-five percent of wires around the world are credited to end beneficiaries in under an hour,” he said. “And 75% reach the end bank within ten minutes. The reality is much faster than the perception.”

The problem, he explained, isn’t speed. It’s friction.

Delays often stem from regulatory checks, FX conversion, or data quality — not the rails themselves.

“There’s no one cross-border market,” O’Neil said. “Payments from the U.S. to India look nothing like payments from Canada to the U.S. Each corridor has its own complexity — regulation, currency controls, even local banking practices.”

That nuance matters. Because as fintech continues to promise “instant global payments,” the real innovation challenge isn’t technology — it’s alignment.

The faster the rails, the more transparent the system needs to be.

ISO 20022: The Common Language of Global Finance

O’Neil’s comments on structured data opened the door to one of the most transformative developments in financial infrastructure today: ISO 20022.

ISO 20022 is an internationally recognized standard for electronic data exchange among financial institutions.

It replaces fragmented, proprietary systems with a unified language that allows richer, more structured payment data to move seamlessly between banks, fintechs, and central systems worldwide.

Initially developed in 2004, ISO 20022 gained global prominence after being endorsed by G20 leaders at their 2020 summit.

This year marks a milestone: in July 2025, the Federal Reserve’s FedNow and Fedwire systems started to require ISO 20022 compatibility for U.S. domestic payments.

The implications are massive. With ISO 20022, payments carry more metadata — such as remittance details, compliance flags, and multilingual data — enabling faster reconciliation, stronger fraud prevention, and improved regulatory reporting.

In short: ISO 20022 turns payments into information-rich, interoperable messages.

It’s not just modernization — it’s the infrastructure of trust.

Inside a Credit Union: Innovation in Reverse

Then we zoomed in from the macro to the micro — from SWIFT’s $100 trillion network to a single credit union in Alabama.

Drew Sullivan, VP at MAX Credit Union, spoke with refreshing honesty.

“Innovation in credit unions isn’t about being first to market,” he said. “It’s about serving members — starting with what they need.”

He described it as “innovation in reverse”: beginning with the member experience, then compliance, and only then technology.

Sometimes, that means prioritizing simplicity over flash.

“Maybe it’s not stablecoins or blockchain,” Sullivan said. “Maybe it’s just helping someone send $100 to their grandmother in Monterrey. That’s the real need.”

It was a grounding moment. Because for all the talk of interoperability and instant settlement, innovation that doesn’t start with human purpose rarely lasts.

And for community institutions like MAX, cross-border capabilities aren’t about disruption — they’re about inclusion.

As Convera’s data reinforces, community banks and credit unions provide 60% of small business loans and 80% of agricultural loans in the U.S. Their role in sustaining local economies gives them an outsized impact when they expand globally.

Cross-border payments, in that sense, aren’t just a service — they’re a form of economic resilience.

The Compliance Equation: From Burden to Differentiator

Then came the topic every fintech founder both fears and needs: compliance.

Judie Rinearson, Partner and Payments Group Leader at K&L Gates, didn’t sugarcoat it.

“Cross-border in the U.S. is uniquely complex,” she said. “We have both federal and state laws — and our states are powerful. If you want to operate nationally, you might need 49 separate licenses. It takes years and hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

Rinearson pulled up a slide that read like a fintech founder’s checklist of nightmares — Reg E, the Bank Secrecy Act, AML/KYC requirements, UDAAP, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, state-level money transmission laws, and now, the emerging Genius Act for stablecoin issuers.

Each of these frameworks governs a different layer of trust:

• Reg E defines consumer protections in electronic funds transfers.
  

• BSA/AML mandates anti-money laundering programs and suspicious activity reporting.
  

• KYC ensures institutions truly know their customers.
  

• UDAAP prohibits unfair or deceptive practices.
  

• And state money transmitter licenses give local regulators oversight of cross-border activity.

“The most successful fintechs use compliance as a benefit, not a burden,” Rinearson said. “Good compliance can actually be a differentiator.”

The key, she added, is cultural.

“Compliance has to start from the top down,” she said. “If you bring your lawyers in only after you’ve finished building your product, it’s already too late.”

Higginson built on that point:

“It’s about trust and verification at scale,” he said. “You need the right technology assets — not just to manage risk, but to enhance the customer experience. Compliance isn’t a blocker; it’s part of the product.”

The “Unhappy Path” — and Why It Matters

O’Neil jumped back in to add an important layer.

“Nobody wants to talk about the unhappy path,” he said. “But you have to. Cybercrime, data reversibility, smart contract errors — those are real risks.”

He shared that SWIFT spent two years building AI governance frameworks to ensure client data couldn’t be reverse-engineered.

That kind of work rarely makes headlines, but it’s what keeps the system running.

“Innovation doesn’t have to be sexy,” O’Neil said. “It’s about improving processes. It’s the boring technology — structured data, ISO 20022 — that makes real innovation possible.”

That perspective resonated with the audience. Because fintech isn’t just about moving fast; it’s about building things that last.

As Higginson added, “The right regulation and technology can actually force change — and that’s a good thing.”

Trust Is the Real Infrastructure

By the time the conversation turned to the future — stablecoins, CBDCs, tokenization — the room was buzzing.

Rinearson pointed to the upcoming Genius Act, which could introduce a unified charter for stablecoin issuers.

“It might finally give us an alternative to 49-state licenses,” she said. “Under the new law, you won’t need to be a bank to issue a stablecoin — but you’ll need real reserves and real reporting.”

For some institutions, that’s a welcome evolution. For others, it’s daunting.

Sullivan, ever pragmatic, smiled and said:

“When I hear ‘cross-border payments’ and ‘stablecoins’ in the same sentence, I think — depends on what article my CEO just read.”

The audience laughed, but his point was serious: innovation moves at the speed of trust.

O’Neil summed it up perfectly:

“Global payments mean you have to pay anyone, anywhere, anytime — but you can only do it through people you know.”

That line stuck with me.

Because for all our advances in AI, instant payments, and blockchain, the infrastructure that truly matters isn’t technological — it’s relational.

Fintech is, and always has been, a trust business.

The Takeaways: What Fintech Leaders Should Learn from Convera Live

1. Interoperability is the innovation.
   

   The era of siloed systems is over. Whether through SWIFT, Convera, or emerging RTP networks, cross-border success now depends on how well institutions connect, not how fast they compete.
   

2. Compliance is product design.
   
   As Rinearson said, good compliance is an advantage. It builds trust, reduces friction, and protects scale. The best fintechs are those that build regulation into their roadmap — not as an afterthought, but as a differentiator.
   

3. Relationships are the ultimate infrastructure.
   

   From community banks to global networks, every success story in payments comes down to human trust. The future belongs to those who understand that connection — not just connection speeds — is what truly moves money.
   

   If the Convera Live panel reminded me of anything, it’s this: the world’s financial systems may be built on rails and regulation, but they run on relationships and trust.

And as we build toward a borderless future, that’s the infrastructure we can’t afford to overlook.

Because when we move together — with transparency, inclusion, and intention — that’s when the future of finance truly becomes global.

🌍 From Conversation to Continuation: Growing Global at Money20/20

As the evening ended, I kept thinking about something Sanjib Kalita from Fintech Meetup said at the start:

“It might seem like this is an industry of ideas, but it’s really an industry of relationships.”

That’s exactly why we’re bringing this conversation to the next stage — literally.

At Money20/20 in Las Vegas, Fintech Is Femme alongside our partners Fintech Meetup, Rosy Finch MC, Joblio, and AscaleX are hosting Growing Global — an exclusive breakfast and live podcast from the Lakeview Penthouse at the Bellagio.

Because the future of fintech isn’t local — it’s borderless.

We’ll explore what it takes to scale internationally with:

🎙️ Mary Murcko of Fintech Meetup,

🎙️ Jessica Johnson of Rosy Finch, and

🎙️ Remy Sirls of the Joblio Foundation.

It’s more than an event — it’s a continuation of this same conversation: how fintech, at its best, doesn’t just move money. It moves possibility.

_{I WANT IT, I GOT IT}

• 🎧 Today’s Listen: Throwing it back to one of my favorite Humans of Fintech LIVE episodes from Money20/20 — featuring the incredible Frances Zelazny, Founder & CEO of Anonybit. Frances is building innovative solutions to tackle one of the world’s biggest challenges: fraud. From her early career in foreign policy to discovering the power of biometrics, Frances shares how her journey shaped her mission to protect personal data in an increasingly digital world.

  Join us as we dive into the intersection of identity, technology, and trust — and explore how we can build a safer, more secure future for everyone. Tune in here.

• 🚀 Today’s Watch: Over the weekend, I finally took some much-needed downtime to catch a movie that’s been on my radar forever — The First Wives Club. And wow… what an iconic film. The energy, the fashion, the friendship — and of course, Diane Keaton being an absolute treasure.

• 🧘‍♀️Today’s Self-Care: Headed into Money20/20 — and the madness that comes with it — with some major self-care in mind. One of my favorite Sunday reset rituals? A trip to Chinatown in Queens for a head spa treatment — the full experience: scalp massage, facial, and deep cleanse. It’s my go-to way to slow down before the chaos, reset my mind, and give my hair that extra shine before a week of back-to-back events. Highly recommend if you’re looking for a little pre-conference primp and peace. 💆🏻‍♀️

_FINTUNES

🎶 RAYE - WHERE IS MY HUSBAND!

Stunning. Fun. Savage.

_{LET’S CONNECT}

📣 Get your tickets and join us tomorrow!

📰 Share this newsletter with a friend and start growing your network.

🔗 Connect with me on LinkedIn for daily insights on female leadership.

📚 The holidays are coming, in charge of purchasing office gifts? Grab my book, Fintech Feminists! It looks nice on the coffee table 😉

That wraps up today’s edition—thanks as always for reading! Until next time, keep innovating and challenging the status quo. 

See you Thursday!

Love,

Nicole 💜