While global headlines fixate on cryptocurrency crashes and Silicon Valley’s AI arms race, a more profound transformation is unfolding across Asia’s telecommunications networks. 

Key takeaways

• Telecom operators are leveraging their 5.6 billion global subscribers and existing infrastructure to provide financial services to 1.4 billion unbanked adults, processing over USD 1.4 trillion in mobile money transactions annually.
• The convergence creates a privacy dilemma where subscriber data enables financial inclusion through AI-driven credit scoring but also risks building surveillance-based financial systems without adequate regulatory oversight.
• Asia’s financial future hinges on whether regulators mandate interoperability across telco-fintech platforms or allow fragmented monopolies, with initiatives like QRIS projected to reach AUD 1.3 trillion by 2030 serving as critical tests.

The convergence of fintech and telecom isn’t just another corporate buzzword. It’s a fundamental restructuring of how 4.5 billion people will access financial services in the coming decade.

The numbers tell a compelling story that traditional financial institutions should find deeply unsettling: mobile money platforms processed over USD 1.4 trillion globally in 2023, with Asia’s East Asia and Pacific region alone accounting for 428 million registered accounts. Yet this isn’t merely about transaction volume. It’s about telecom operators accomplishing what banks have failed to do for generations: reaching the financially invisible.

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Key Players & Success Stories (2025–2026)

The landscape has shifted from simple “e-wallets” to sophisticated digital banks.

Market	Lead Player	Model	Status (2026)
Philippines	GCash (Globe)	Super-App	Now the primary financial tool for >80% of Filipinos; leading in “wallet-to-card” integration.
Singapore	GXS Bank (Grab + Singtel)	Digital Bank	Dominating the gig-economy segment with daily interest and seamless “eco-system” lending.
Malaysia	Boost (Axiata)	Digital Bank	Recently transitioned from a wallet to a full bank, focusing on SME micro-financing.
Thailand	TrueMoney (True Corp)	Payment Rail	Leading the charge in the Thai Ministry of Finance’s new virtual bank licenses (expected mid-20

The Infrastructure Advantage Banks Can’t Replicate

The genius of telco-led fintech lies not in technological sophistication, but in leveraging existing infrastructure asymmetries. Globe Telecom’s GCash in the Philippines serves 94 million users, more than the country’s entire adult population, because telecommunications operators solved the “last mile” problem decades ago. They already possess the distribution networks, customer relationships, and trust frameworks that challenger banks must build from scratch at ruinous cost.

Consider the contrasting trajectories: while China’s traditional telecom revenue crawled forward at 0.7% in 2025, operators pivoted to financial services that capitalize on their 5.6 billion global mobile subscribers. This isn’t diversification born of strength. It’s survival instinct meeting structural opportunity. And the timing couldn’t be more fortuitous.

Financial Inclusion or Corporate Expansion? Perhaps Both

The World Bank’s figure of 1.4 billion unbanked adults globally sounds like a humanitarian crisis, and telcos have positioned themselves as the solution. Bangladesh’s bKash, scaled with Axiata Group’s backing, now serves over 70 million users in a country where traditional banking infrastructure remains sparse and geographically concentrated in urban centers.

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Why Asia? (The Leapfrog Effect)

The reason telco-led fintech thrived in Asia while struggling in the US/Europe is the lack of legacy infrastructure.

Many Asian consumers skipped the “Credit Card/Physical Bank” phase and went straight from cash to smartphones. In 2026, mobile applications hold a staggering 72.6% of the fintech market share in the region.

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But let’s be clear-eyed about motivations: telecom operators aren’t charitable institutions. They’re responding to existential threats like commoditized connectivity, margin compression, and infrastructure debt by extracting more value from existing customer relationships. That their commercial interests align with social goods like financial inclusion is fortunate coincidence, not altruistic design.

The question isn’t whether telco-fintech advances inclusion (it demonstrably does), but whether these operators will become the new gatekeepers of financial access, replacing bank monopolies with telecom oligopolies. Early signs suggest concentration risks are real: a handful of operators are capturing dominant market shares in payments, lending, and insurance across multiple Southeast Asian markets.

The Data Dilemma: Enabler or Privacy Minefield?

Telecom operators’ “secret weapon,” granular subscriber data enabling alternative credit scoring, is simultaneously their greatest capability and biggest vulnerability. When operators use behavioral data to extend microloans to users lacking formal credit histories, they’re democratizing access. When that same data becomes fodder for surveillance capitalism, they’re building Orwellian financial ecosystems.

The Asian Development Bank’s enthusiasm for AI-driven credit assessment tools overlooks uncomfortable realities: these systems often perpetuate existing biases while creating new forms of algorithmic discrimination. A farmer in rural Vietnam denied credit by an opaque AI model has less recourse than one rejected by a human loan officer who must justify decisions.

As 5G networks expand (Ericsson forecasts 1.5 billion Asia Pacific subscriptions by 2030), the volume and granularity of monetizable data will explode. The regulatory frameworks governing this data remain woefully inadequate across most Asian jurisdictions. We’re building the financial nervous system of a digital economy on privacy foundations made of sand.

Interoperability: The Test of Genuine Progress

The convergence of telecom and fintech now enters its most critical phase, defined not by individual platform success but by interoperability and cross-border integration. Initiatives like Project Nexus and Indonesia’s QRIS expansion (projected to reach AUD 1.3 trillion by 2030 across 30 million merchants) will determine whether we’re building an interconnected regional financial ecosystem or a fragmented patchwork of walled gardens.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: telecom operators have every commercial incentive to maintain proprietary ecosystems that lock in users and maximize data capture. True interoperability, where a GCash user seamlessly transacts with a bKash merchant across borders with minimal friction and transparent fees, undermines operator moats and commoditizes their platforms.

Yet without aggressive interoperability mandates, Asia risks replicating at regional scale the same fragmentation that stifled innovation in European payments for decades. Regulators must force operators to choose: become interoperable infrastructure layers supporting regional commerce, or remain siloed platforms serving narrow national markets.

The Coming Collision with Big Tech

Telecom operators currently enjoy first-mover advantages in fintech, but their dominance is hardly assured. Digital-native fintech firms operate with agile development models and superior customer experience strategies. More ominously, global technology giants with deeper pockets and more sophisticated AI capabilities are circling these markets.

The competitive dynamics will intensify as platforms like Singapore’s Singtel (through GXS Bank) and India’s Reliance Jio (via Jio Financial Services) expand beyond national borders. Some operators will succeed in becoming regional digital banks. Others will be reduced to “dumb pipes” carrying transactions for fintech platforms that captured the customer relationship.

Success will require more than scale. It demands world-class cybersecurity, sophisticated fraud prevention, regulatory navigation across diverse jurisdictions, and customer experience excellence. Most telecom operators are telecommunications companies trying to become financial institutions. That transition is far harder than industry optimism suggests.

What’s Really at Stake

The telco-fintech convergence represents more than industry evolution. It’s a referendum on whether Asia will build inclusive, interoperable digital financial infrastructure or fragmented systems that replicate offline inequities in digital form.

If executed well, with appropriate regulatory oversight and genuine commitment to interoperability, telco-led fintech could accelerate financial inclusion, enable cross-border commerce, and provide millions of underserved consumers with access to credit, insurance, and wealth-building tools. The GSMA data showing 18% year-over-year growth in active mobile money accounts across East Asia and Pacific suggests this potential is being realized.

If executed poorly, with inadequate privacy protections, monopolistic practices, and regulatory capture, we risk creating new forms of financial exclusion where algorithmic gatekeepers replace human ones, and vast populations become dependent on opaque platforms accountable to shareholders rather than users.

The next five years will be decisive. As digital adoption continues expanding at 4.9% annually across Asian markets, the architectural choices made today about interoperability, data governance, and competition policy will shape financial access for billions of people across multiple generations.

Telecom operators didn’t set out to revolutionize finance. They stumbled into it while searching for revenue growth beyond commoditized connectivity. But intent matters less than impact. And the impact of telco-led fintech on Asia’s economic future will be profound, for better or worse.

The question isn’t whether this revolution will happen. It’s already happening. The question is whether it will be inclusive or extractive, interoperable or fragmented, empowering or exploitative. Those outcomes aren’t predetermined. They depend on regulatory choices and competitive dynamics still being contested across Asian capitals.

Traditional banks had decades to solve financial inclusion and failed. Telecom operators have been given a second chance. How they use it will define not just their industry’s future, but the economic prospects of billions of people across the world’s most dynamic region.

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IDFC First Bank, which recently disclosed ₹590 crore unauthorised transactions linked to Haryana government accounts, says the incident was isolated and confined to a single branch in Chandigarh. The transactions were executed using forged cheques and manually carried out at the branch, managing director and chief executive V Vaidyanathan tells ET’s Saloni Shukla. Edited excerpts:

What went wrong, and how did these transactions occur?

Certain employees of a branch in Chandigarh, most possibly in connivance with external parties, have fraudulently transferred these amounts to beneficiaries who had accounts outside IDFC First Bank, the details of which will emerge after investigation.

Has the bank appointed a forensic auditor?

The bank is appointing KPMG to conduct an independent forensic audit to get to the bottom of this issue.

Were these transactions executed electronically or manually?
As per our preliminary assessment, the transactions were carried out using forged and fraudulent authorisation letters and cheques. So these are manual transactions done at the branch level.What internal controls and checks are ordinarily in place for handling such government-linked accounts, and how were these bypassed or compromised?

The bank has necessary controls in place, including maker, checker and authoriser for clearing cheques or debit instructions from the department. We have been in operation for over 10 years and have rolled out over 1,000 branches and have had no such incident before. As part of the control process, the bank also sends periodic system-generated statements and communications to the registered customer IDs, including mobile alerts, SMS transaction alerts, monthly bank statements and monthly balance confirmation certificates. But in this case, it appears that connivance between the employees and third parties has led to the clearing of instruments, which in hindsight are appearing forged. Prima facie third-party entities are involved in this compromise.

Is the issue strictly limited to one branch in Chandigarh?

The issue is specific to one branch and one client group and is thus an isolated instance. There is no system-level issue. All branches of the bank are running smoothly.

Could the financial impact exceed ₹590 crore?

We have put out the number as we could best assess at this point of time. The financial impact would depend upon recoveries or any additional claims, but our best estimate is that this number is appropriate to the situation. As you know the bank is well capitalised, and profitability is on a positive trajectory because of falling credit costs and expected improvement in net interest margin during the fourth quarter, and hence, this number should be manageable.

What steps are the bank taking to recover the funds? What actions are being initiated against the individuals involved?

We are making efforts to trace the flow of funds and will seek appropriate restoration of funds where possible. The bank will pursue strict civil and criminal action against the perpetrators, internal or external, involved and responsible for this incident. We are determined to get to the root of this.While the initial impact has been assessed at ₹590 crore, the final financial implication will depend on further information, validation of claims and potential recoveries. These may include lien marking on suspected beneficiary accounts held with other banks, liabilities of other entities involved in the transactions and legal recovery proceedings. The bank has sent recall requests to certain beneficiary banks to mark liens on balances in suspicious accounts.

Mumbai: Indian equities head into Monday with measured optimism after a US Supreme Court verdict declared US President Donald Trump’s tariffs illegal, setting off a fresh turn in the trade narrative. Trump followed up with a 10% levy, later raising it to 15% on all countries. Effectively, this is lower than the rates agreed earlier this month, but the fresh uncertainty around tariffs, along with simmering tensions between the US and Iran are likely to keep any optimism under check.

“The framework reached between India and the US earlier this month was already neutral, but now, since there is a question mark on those tariffs as well,” said A Balasubramanian, MD & CEO, Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC. “The market is likely to see some short covering action, but the gains are not expected to be outsized. The upmove could be in the 1% range.”

Last week, the Sensex and Nifty rose as much 0.4% in rollercoaster trading as Brent crude futures firmed up, staying above the $71 mark on Friday, on fears of a potential US military strike on Iran.

The market has remained volatile for most of February, even after India and the US signed a trade deal that brought tariffs down to 18% from 50%. The higher tariffs by the US on Indian imports were seen as a key concern for the stock market before that.

While the tariffs are now seen even lower at 15%, the move does not ensure a runaway rally immediately.

“The lowered tariffs from 18% to 15% is expected to be neutral from an equity market perspective. It remains unclear whether the contours of the India-US trade deal that was anticipated to be signed soon will be renegotiated,” said Sunny Agrawal, head of Fundamental Research, SBI Securities. “Investors will have to brace for extreme volatility due to frequent changes in policy stance and pursuant macro and sector-specific impact.”
Balasubramanian said the initial knee-jerk reaction may give way to consolidation as investors look to earnings and currency cues for direction. “In terms of valuations, the markets are not very expensive nor cheap, but the animal spirits are missing due to lower nominal GDP numbers on account of low inflation and investors awaiting an earnings upgrade,” he said.

Mumbai: Traders have ramped up bearish derivative bets on India’s IT sector to the highest levels in recent times, as global AI-related developments have raised questions over the prospects of software exporters and triggered a sharp risk-off sentiment in the sector.

While most IT stock futures are seeing their biggest position build-up in 2026, bearish wagers in Infosys, Coforge and Persistent Systems are at their highest levels on record, according to SBI Securities.

The Nifty IT index is down over 17% since February 3 after San Francisco-based AI company Anthropic announced the launch of its new automation tool, Claude Cowork, a move that intensified fears of the growth trajectories of software companies.

Open interest (OI) or outstanding positions in large-cap IT stock futures has risen 39% as of February 20, compared with the average cumulative open interest between January 1, 2024 and January 31, 2026, according to SBI Securities. The increase in the case of mid-cap IT contracts stands at 70%.

“The massive rise in OI when read with the sharp fall in stock prices implies extreme short-build up in IT Stocks,” said Sudeep Shah, head – Technical and Derivative Research, SBI Securities.

The extent of the rollovers in IT stock futures to March when NSE’s February contracts expire on Tuesday will give analysts a clearer picture of how traders are positioning themselves in the near term.

“If rollovers approach previous levels in the remaining two sessions, it will indicate a significant rollover of short positions,” said Rajesh Palviya, head of Technical and Derivatives Research at Axis Securities. The rollover of positions to the March series stood at 67% as of Friday, compared with 96% in the previous expiry. Infosys has seen rollovers of 74.6% against 89.4% in the previous series, while that in TCS stands at 65.6% versus 96.4% in the February series. The nervousness around the IT stocks is palpable with the Nifty IT index closing lower on 10 out of 16 trading sessions in February. Shares of IT stocks have declined between 11% and 19% so far this month. Coforge is down nearly 19%, while LTIMindtree and Infosys have dropped about 18% each.A combined reading of derivative indicators signals absence of investor interest in these stocks. “On days when IT stocks attempted to recover, Open Interest did not rise significantly. This tells us that most upside moves were driven by short covering rather than fresh buying interest, or in other words, traders have not yet shown strong conviction to build new long positions,” said Dhupesh Dhameja, derivatives analyst at Samco Securities. Dhameja said sentiment remains cautious ahead of the monthly expiry. “The options data shows noticeable call writing at near-term resistance levels, which suggests that traders expect limited upside in the immediate term.

Put writing has been seen at lower levels, but this appears more defensive and hedged in nature rather than aggressive bullish positioning,” he said. Shah advised against trying to time purchases in IT stocks as their technical structure remains weak for now. “It is prudent to wait for the IT index to stabilise and for clear signs of strong buying interest before planning fresh exposure,” he said.

Major delivery platforms are temporarily suspending their New York City operations as a powerful blizzard slams the region and Mayor Zohran Mamdani enforces a citywide travel ban.

Grubhub told FOX Business it will shut down service in both New York City and New Jersey at 7:30 p.m. ET on Sunday and will remain closed overnight.

“We will re-assess in the morning,” a company spokesperson said, emphasizing that the safety of its delivery partners remains the company’s top priority.

DoorDash confirmed to FOX Weather that it will halt service citywide beginning at 8:30 p.m. ET Sunday — 30 minutes before the city’s 9 p.m. travel ban takes effect. The company noted operations could shut down even sooner if weather conditions deteriorate further.

THOUSANDS OF US FLIGHTS CANCELED AS NORTHEAST BRACES FOR BLIZZARD

Service is expected to remain suspended until at least noon on Monday. DoorDash said the early suspension is intended to ensure orders are completed and delivery workers are safely off the roads before streets officially close.

“New York City is bracing itself ahead of a historic blizzard — the first in nearly a decade — with a foot of snow or more and dangerous wind gusts expected,” a DoorDash spokesperson told FOX Weather. “We’re suspending operations early to keep Dashers safe and off the streets before the travel ban takes effect.”

DoorDash said it will continue tracking weather conditions and guidance from officials and will provide updates to delivery workers, merchants and customers as needed.

ESSENTIAL WINTER DRIVING TIPS AS A MAJOR STORM APPROACHES

The service changes come as a powerful “bomb cyclone” slams the Northeast, bringing life-threatening blizzard conditions, wind gusts up to 60 mph and the potential for more than two feet of snow in parts of the I-95 corridor, according to FOX Weather.

Mayor Mamdani declared a state of emergency ahead of the storm, announcing that all city streets, highways and bridges will close to non-emergency traffic starting at 9 p.m. Sunday and remain closed until noon Monday.

The blanket restriction applies to all vehicles — including cars, trucks, scooters and e-bikes — with limited exemptions for emergency movements and critical service workers.

CHRISTMAS TRAVELERS LEFT STRANDED AS AIRPORTS SEE MASS FLIGHT CANCELATIONS, DELAYS

“Please, for your safety, stay home, stay inside and stay off the roads. Hazardous conditions put delivery workers, drivers and restaurant staff at risk,” Mamdani said. “If you can do so, please look out for your fellow New Yorkers and prepare meals at home until the weather improves.”

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Other delivery platforms, including Uber Eats and Instacart, could not immediately be reached by FOX Business for comment.

Fox News Digital’s Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.