The leaders who are making payments 'invisible'

• Key insight: Embedded payments have grown in recent years.
• Look forward: It's a goal that's existed for years, inspired by ride-sharing apps like Uber that allow customers to book and pay for rides without checking out.  
• What's at stake: The technology that enables "invisible payments" is dramatically improving, creating a race among banks to get on board. 

The future of payments and finance depends on making transactions automatic, easy and almost out of sight.

It's a goal that's existed for years, inspired by ride-sharing apps like Uber that allow customers to book and pay for rides without checking out. What's changing is that the technology that enables "invisible payments" is dramatically improving, creating a race among banks to get on board.

"Payments are a commodity, and customers choose who and how to interact based on ease of the experience," Tessa Naroditsky, senior vice president and director of payments strategy for commercial banking at Comerica Bank , who says embedded finance and payments are "incredibly important" for banks.

Embedded payments, a part of embedded finance, is taking the financial services industry by storm. Naroditsky, who is a Most Powerful Women in Banking: NEXT honoree, as well as Citigroup's Pam Habner, and Fifth Third's Bridgit Chayt, two of the Most Powerful Women in Banking for 2025, spoke about the trend and the competitive necessity for banks to be involved. "It's an exciting time for payments, and I enjoy seeing the unique collaborations between banks and non-banks in this space," Naroditsky said.

What's going on?

Embedded payments can mean several things, but it usually refers to placing payments inside external services such as apps and websites. Consumers select a method and pay through a link enabling a single-click checkout, avoiding cumbersome steps such as adding card information and other credentials on a checkout page. Embedded finance is adding banking and other financial products in apps or sites for non-financial companies, such as accessing a card via a streaming content service.

"The U.S. is one of the most mature markets in the world when it comes to data sharing," Kieran Hines, principal banking analyst at Celent, told American Banker, noting the U.S. does not have an open banking law, or regulation governing open banking and revenue structure such as fees for data. Despite this uncertainty, banks are adding open banking to power adjacent services such as embedded finance, as consumer demand grows "A lot of banks think about open banking as essential," Hines said.

What banks are doing

Comerica is working on projects that are designed to improve how the bank supports products delivered via partners. That includes work on the application programming interfaces that support connections for data sharing and other elements of embedded banking and payments.

The bank is also adding technology to power real-time payments, using instant settlement rails such as FedNow and The Clearing House's RTP network to schedule payments for a specific time, and to include more data and actionable details from payments.

"To continue to grow and participate in the global payments conversation, banks need to invest in understanding and developing simple user experiences that meet customers where they are at and solve real customer problems," Naroditsky said. That includes bringing payment capabilities directly into non-bank experiences and partnering in new ways with customers.

Comerica is just one of the thousands of banks that are ramping up investments in open banking and embedded finance.

Citigroup is also moving into the same territory."Embedded payments have become a strategic advantage for banks as consumers seek simpler, more flexible ways to manage purchases across physical and digital channels," Citi's Pam Habner, head of branded cards and lending, told American Banker. Habner oversees more than 35 million consumer accounts and 630 employees, and has led initiatives such as Citi's new premium card, Strata Elite, that includes perks and loyalty programs with the bank's partner merchants.Part of Habner's work includes leading projects that insert payment and financing options within the customer experience.

Citi has worked with its partners to place financial offers and products into their preferred channels as they seek to provide customers with what the banks called "seamless and in the moment" consumer experiences. A recent example is the Citi Flex Pay offering, where the bank has discovered that integrating financing directly into the checkout process, such as through digital wallets, creates seamless experiences that customers value. The product also enables payments in Amazon's ecosystem while allowing consumers to pay via CitiThankYou Points, an incentive marketing product.

"This kind of embedded capability meets customer preferences exactly where they are and makes flexible payments part of their everyday experience," Habner said.

The demand

Research suggests embedded payments are becoming a vital strategy for banks. The global embedded payments market is expected to expand by 134% between the end of 2024 and 2028, with embedded account-to-account payments and digital wallet payments being the primary payment types, according to Juniper Research. KPMG reports 58% of banks said embedded finance is a priority in the next year, with 75% naming open banking, or data-sharing technology that supports embedded payments, as a priority.

Banks are also acquiring fintechs to bolster their open banking and embedded finance strategies. In 2023, Fifth Third acquired Rize Money, a fintech that has helped the bank launch Newline, which offers embedded payments. Newline has partnered with payment firms such as Stripe, Trustly, Brex and Nuvei.

Newline lets these clients integrate financial products and services via application programming interface or file transfer. These include payment processing capabilities, bank account creation and card issuance."Embedded finance is part of banking today and we're not just embracing it, we're building it into our tech stack, our relationships and our role as a leader in the financial landscape," Bridgit Chayt, executive vice president and head of commercial payments and treasury management at Fifth Third Bank