Revolut draws an AML fine | PaymentsSource

The Bank of Lithuania has fined British fintech Revolut 3.5 million euros ($3.8 million) for violating the country’s anti-money-laundering requirements. 

The levy came after a scheduled inspection of Revolut Bank, during which the central bank identified “shortcomings” in the way Revolut monitored business relationships and transactions, resulting in Revolut “not always properly identifying suspicious monetary operations and transactions carried out by customers in transactions,” the central bank said. 

Revolut has 590,000 customers in Lithuania and offers payment, savings and investment accounts, and credit cards and personal loans in the country. It also offers robo-investment tools and cryptocurrency exchange services, according to its website.  —Joey Pizzolato

Contactless payments hit record in UK

Contactless payments continued to gain steam with U.K. consumers at the point of sale last year, according to Barclays. 

Nearly 95% of all eligible in-store payments were contactless in 2024, up from about 93% in 2023. The average contactless purchase was £16.10 ($20.65) in 2024. The average person used the technology 236 times, equating to total spending of £3,803 ($4876.89) per person. 

Consumers over the age of 65 were the fastest growing group using contactless payments, marking the fourth year in a row the group led adoption. 

“Convenience is the driving force behind contactless technology becoming so embedded in the UK’s payment ecosystem,” Karen Johnson, head of retail at Barclays, said in a statement. “The increasing prevalence of self-service screens at retail and hospitality venues shows the importance of a smooth experience, regardless of the sector.” —Joey Pizzolato

David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

Stripe boosts Chinese coffee chains’ international ambitions

Luckin Coffee has partnered with Stripe to build a cross-border payment system to support its move into Singapore, Malaysia and other markets. The coffee chain, which is one of China’s largest merchants, accepts primarily mobile payments tied to the country’s digital wallets, and is attempting to adjust to outside markets that rely more on credit cards and non-Chinese digital wallets. Luckin and Cargee, another Chinese coffee chain, are also expanding to the U.S. to rival Starbucks, which has been building a network in China for years. Stripe’s technology will surface the consumer’s preferred payment method, including Apple Pay, Google Pay and Grab Pay — the Asian ride-sharing app’s payments system. 

Stripe has expanded in Asia in recent years, helping the company manage economic weakness that affected the payments market in the early 2020s following the COVID-19 pandemic. Investment in financial technology expanded in that period, supporting Stripe’s move into markets such as Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Indonesia and other markets. 

Stripe in 2021 partnered with UnionPay, the Chinese payment card network, deepening the San Francisco and Dublin-based payment company’s ties to the region. —John Adams  

Jasper Juinen/Bloomberg News

Adyen expands American legal payments network

Dutch payments processor Adyen has signed LegalZoom, which is planning to embrace technology designed to present the best payment option at the point of sale.

Called intelligence payment routing, or payments orchestration, the idea is to route a payment to the best option based on price, time and other factors. The concept has gained ground as more merchants and businesses look to centralize their payment technology relationships to reduce the amount of money they are paying technology vendors.

The Amsterdam-based Adyen has been building its business in North America for the past several years, adding products that are designed to compete with Block, Stripe, PayPal and other companies that use payment technology to build financial relationships. 

Adding The Glendale, California-based LegalZoom as a client aids that strategy. —John Adams  

NatWest bets on open banking startup

NatWest has made an undisclosed investment in Yonder, a U.K. firm that uses open banking data to make it easier for people with a lack of credit history to apply for a credit card. This data, which comes via permissioned sharing among accounts, can also be used to personalize incentive marketing programs such as cash-back offers or experiences tied to payments behavior. NatWest will partner with Yonder to develop consumer experience-oriented marketing for the bank’s 19 million consumers. 

“Today’s consumer wants financial experiences that are personal, easy and that seamlessly integrate into their daily lives,” said Ladi Greenstreet, head of strategic investments at NatWest Group, in a release. Yonder was founded in 2022, using startup funding of about $35 million.

NatWest’s Yonder investment comes as banks focus on improving their usage of data, with 25% of bank executives saying their data strategy is superior to their peers, according to research from Arizent, American Banker’s publisher. —John Adams 

Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg

WhatsApp-powered transfer app scores with investors

Félix has raised $75 million from QED and other investors, raising funds to expand its cross-border payments product.

The Venezuela-based Félix uses a chatbot to power cross-border payments. Consumers use WhatsApp to speak or write how much to send to a recipient. That triggers a secured link that asks for debit card details to complete the transaction. Félix plans to use the additional funds to develop new payment types, enter more markets and hire additional staff.

Félix, whose clients include Brazilian-based challenger bank NuBank, processed more than $1 billion in remittance and added 250,000 users in 2024.

It uses the USDC stablecoin to manage exchange rate volatility — the app converts currency on the front end of the transfer to USDC, then converts to the recipient’s currency on receipt.

WhatsApp has been used to facilitate voice-enabled digital payments in markets such as India, though banks have faced fines for misusing WhatsApp and other messaging platforms by failing to properly store communications.  —John Adams 

Payabl. nabs Lloyds’ embedded finance head to lead banking division

European fintech payabl. has appointed Lee Dunne as its head of banking to oversee the company’s banking strategy. 

Dunne joins the London-based payments firm from Lloyd’s Banking Group, where he served as head of embedded finance. He has also held roles at Barclays and Worldpay. 

His appointment comes on the heels of the company’s launch of Business Accounts, a multicurrency IBAN product that helps businesses transaction internationally. 

“Lee joins payabl. at a very exciting stage of our growth,” said Ugne Buraciene, group CEO of payabl. in a statement. “His expertise will be instrumental in advancing our Business Accounts offering and strengthening our financial partnerships. His strategic approach and industry knowledge will further enhance our ability to provide businesses with seamless financial solutions.” —Joey Pizzolato

Brazil’s Pix to add installment payment capabilities

Brazil’s central bank said it would begin allowing Pix users to pay for transactions in installments starting in September in a move that is expected to further increase adoption of the country’s instant payment system. 

The program, called Pix Parcelado, will be available to both consumers and merchants, Reuter’s first reported. 

Pix posted 5.6 billion transactions in February 2025, up from 4.3 billion in the same period in 2024, according to the central bank. Pix is the most popular payment method in Brazil. —Joey Pizzolato