During 3-5 June 2025, Euromonitor attended Money20/20 Europe, a premier event attracting thousands of attendees from the payments and fintech sector to Amsterdam to discuss the future of money. This year’s conference featured many insightful discussions and bold claims about what’s next for the industry. Many conference sessions were centred around the following three topics: AI-driven innovation, embedded commerce, and the evolution of open banking.
A long-standing buzzword, artificial intelligence (AI) continued to be one of the key themes for fintech in 2025. Industry leaders like Mastercard and Worldpay underscored AI’s growing influence, illustrating how it is being leveraged for everything from hyper-personalising payment methods and shipping options based on individual customer risk profiles to proactively mitigating fraud at the point of checkout. This highlights AI’s established utility in optimising existing processes and enhancing security.
A great deal of attention at the conference was given to a forward-looking theme of agentic AI. This novel form of AI distinguishes itself by empowering autonomous systems capable of independently managing financial transactions and customer interactions. Payments giants such as Mastercard and Visa presented compelling visions of how these payment agents are poised to fundamentally redefine the role of AI. Unlike previous iterations that largely acted as assistive tools, agentic AI introduces self-directed, goal-seeking digital actors that can not only sense and interpret complex data but also independently make decisions and execute actions across the entire e-commerce value chain. This represents a significant leap, suggesting a future where AI moves beyond predictive analytics to become an active, intelligent participant in financial ecosystems.
Embedded commerce: Redefining consumer interactions
Embedded commerce is reshaping how consumers engage with financial services, demonstrated vividly by platforms like TikTok where transactions are completed entirely within the in-app user experience. According to Euromonitor’s Voice of the Consumer: Digital Survey (fielded March-April 2024), 81% of social media users globally have used Instagram or TikTok at least daily, while 51% of Instagram users have used it to find out information about brands, products and services. This requires significant change from traditional models: merchants are no longer solely focused on bringing customers to products; instead, they now prioritise bringing products directly to where consumers already engage digitally.
Several sessions highlighted the new challenges this approach introduces, notably elevated risks around fraud and chargebacks due to reduced direct interaction between consumers and merchants. Biometric authentication methods and passkeys were identified as critical tools for securing embedded transactions, leveraging advanced tokenisation to enhance consumer convenience and transaction security.
Open banking: Transitioning from innovation to mainstream
Open banking was discussed extensively, reflecting its progression from experimental innovation to a mainstream payment method. Partnerships, such as the one between Mastercard and Deutsche Bank, were highlighted as pivotal in facilitating direct pay-by-bank solutions for merchants, offering instant, irrevocable payments. Experts from BNP Paribas and Santander emphasised infrastructure readiness and API stability as essential factors driving widespread adoption. Additionally, evolving EU regulations, including PSD3 and the Instant Payments Regulation, were identified as crucial elements supporting this transition. The conference made clear that open banking is rapidly maturing into a fundamental component of the European payments ecosystem, promising increased competition and improved payment experiences for businesses and consumers alike.
This year’s Money20/20 Europe underscored a clear directive: successful payments innovation requires relentless technological advancement, consumer-centric design, and partnerships between various players in the ecosystem. By prioritising emerging technologies like AI, embedding financial services seamlessly into digital consumer experiences, and scaling open banking initiatives, the industry is actively shaping a secure, inclusive and innovative payments landscape.
For more insight on how agentic AI will shape commerce, read our Top Five Digital Shopper Trends in 2025 briefing.