Ant's AI push, PayPal's stablecoin adoption

Ant expands AI into more financial services

Ant Group, which is affiliated with e-commerce and financial services brands such as Alibaba and Alipay, is testing two new finance-specific artificial intelligence programs. Zhi Xiao Zhu 1.0 supports analysis on investments and other tasks for professions inside the financial services industry. Zhi Xiao Zhu 2.0 is designed for consumer use, enabling financial tips and market analysis. AI has drawn attention from investors globally in the past year, partly due to advancements in the underlying technology that enables AI to produce original content, such as ChatGPT. Financial institutions are starting to deploy newer forms of AI, but are still using the technology primarily for internal use as consumer demand and knowledge catch up. —John Adams

PayPal's stablecoin picks up support

Cryptocurrency payment service company BitPay will provide global support for PayPal USD, enabling payments for consumers and merchants. The merchants at launch include video game firm Xsolla, which will enable consumers to use PayPal's stablecoin to make payments on its various games and features. Merchants can add support for PayPal's stablecoin without making changes to their payment systems, which are available via BitPay Wallet, PayPal Wallet, Metamask or other Ethereum compatible digital wallets. PayPal USD launched in August, adding a stablecoin for PayPal's existing international base of merchants and consumers. PayPal also supports cryptocurrency buying and selling via both PayPal and its Venmo person-to-perso app. PayPal USD is backed by U.S. dollars short-term U.S. treasuries and similar cash equivalents, and like most stablecoins is designed to hedge against cryptocurrency volatility. PayPal's stablecoin is facing opposition in Europe, where a member of the European Central Bank's board contends it will harm competition. —John Adams

Visa partners with U.K. open-banking startup

Visa has entered a commercial partnership with Form3, a London-based payments platform that provides security for real-time account-to-account payments conducted by banks in the U.K., Europe and the U.S., according to a press release. Visa also invested in the firm, which launched in 2016, but did not disclose the amount. The partnership will enable Visa clients to minimize fraud when sending and receiving real-time account-to-account payments by combining Form3's fraud-detection tools with Visa's AI and risk-scoring features, the release said. —Kate Fitzgerald

Mastercard collaborates with U.K. fintech on small-business payments

Mastercard has expanded its partnership with Paysend to support cross-border payments for small to medium-sized businesses. The firms have released a co-developed service called Open Payment Network, which orchestrates payment flows from initiation to settlement. It supports near-real time payments through connections between Mastercard, Paysend and local network partners. Paysend has additionally joined the Mastercard Send Partner Program, an initiative that connects fintechs, merchant acquirers, payment processors and technology platforms to support real-time payment processing. Paysend will use its membership in the program to set up new international payment corridors inside Europe as well as between European countries and markets in other parts of the world. —John Adams

NAB digitizes health care bills

NICAPS, NAB's digital health care claiming service, has built digital invoicing tech in an attempt to streamline how health care providers interact with Australia's National Disability Insurance Scheme. Businesses that provide disability service and health care use NICAPS NDIS Invoice Anyone to send standardized bills. About 88% of the $36 billion spent on NDIS services in the past year were funneled through the Invoice Anyone rail. Automating bills is part of a broader project to upgrade the entire NDIS operation to make it easier for businesses and consumers to access. NAB is the first major bank in Australia to update its NDIS-related invoices. —John Adams

Tap to Pay gets a larger audience in Australia

ANZ's joint venture with payment processor Worldline has introduced Tap to Pay on iPhone to the bank's clients in Australia. Tap to Pay enables iPhones to accept contactless payments without additional hardware beyond the phone. At checkout, businesses prompt their customers to hold their iPhone or Apple Watch to make a payment via Visa, Mastercard, or digital wallet. Android and Apple's Tap to Pay products are growing quickly in many markets as payment companies and merchants look for alternatives to expand contactless payments with minimal expense. Tap to Pay, or softPOS, is also considered an intermediary technology to checkout-free retail, which does not require a dedicated point of sale but instead relies on cameras and consumers' e-commerce accounts. —John Adams

UBS to cut hundreds of wealth jobs in Asia

UBS Group AG is cutting Asia wealth-management jobs in the low hundreds, just months after completing its takeover of rival Credit Suisse as the bank responds to muted client activity and China's slowing economy. Switzerland's largest bank reduced some overlapping roles in the past months and further cuts are expected through November, according to people with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified as the plans are private. At least 100 positions could go, one of the people said. The lender is set to eliminate roles that include relationship managers in Hong Kong and Singapore, the majority within teams newly acquired from Credit Suisse, the people said. The number of cuts hasn't been finalized, they said. The lender plans to keep the majority of private bankers in Australia and India for now, one of the people said. A UBS spokesperson declined to comment. —Ambereen Choudhury and Chanyaporn Chanjaroen, Bloomberg News

Credit Suisse chief operating officer to leave bank for new role

Credit Suisse Chief Operating Officer Francesca McDonagh is leaving the firm three months after its emergency takeover by rival UBS Group. McDonagh has decided to resign "to pursue a new opportunity outside of the bank," Credit Suisse Chief Executive Officer Ulrich Koerner said in an internal memo on Monday seen by Bloomberg and confirmed by a spokesperson. "I am very appreciative of her leadership," Koerner said in the memo, adding McDonagh will "remain available to ensure a smooth transition."

McDonagh is one of the first high-profile departures since a cull among Credit Suisse's leadership shortly after the historic takeover closed in early June. Chief Financial Officer Dixit Joshi and Investment Bank Co-Head David Miller left at that time. The memo didn't specify the role McDonagh is taking up. UBS agreed to buy Credit Suisse in March in a rescue engineered by the Swiss government after a collapse of client and investor confidence. UBS Chief Executive Officer Sergio Ermotti and Chairman Colm Kelleher have since moved quickly to integrate the competitor, including by replacing top executives. The Swiss bank is currently cutting hundreds of wealth-management jobs in Asia in response to muted client activity and China's slowing economy, Bloomberg reported earlier Monday. —Steven Arons, Bloomberg News

Barclays to cut hundreds of jobs across trading, investment bank

Barclays is preparing to cut hundreds of jobs as soon as next week as the firm looks to trim costs amid quieter markets. The lender is planning to dismiss about 5% of client-facing staff in the trading division as well as some dealmakers globally as part of the cuts, according to people familiar with the matter. Separately, the firm is also preparing to restructure teams within its UK consumer-banking unit, the people said, asking not to be named discussing personnel information. "We do not comment on speculation," Barclays said in a statement. "We regularly review our operations to ensure we meet the evolving needs of our customers and clients in an efficient and effective way."

Barclays Chief Executive Officer C.S. Venkatakrishnan has been under pressure to boost profits and improve the bank's share price. As part of that, he's vowed to reduce expenses across the firm and embarked on a wide-reaching review of strategy. The moves are part of the bank's annual culling of underperformers in its markets division and corporate and investment bank, the people said. Goldman Sachs is also planning to begin those annual cuts as soon as next month. —Jan-Henrik Förster, Harry Wilson and Irina Anghel, Bloomberg News