As we move through 2026, the global payments landscape has transitioned from a period of experimental digital shifts to one of structural permanence. For software leaders and financial architects, the challenge is no longer about “going digital”—it is about orchestrating a complex, multi-layered environment where money, identity, and autonomous logic converge.
At Adanto Software, we are observing a fundamental shift in how value moves. The infrastructure of 2026 is defined by five key pillars that every executive must integrate into their strategic roadmap to remain competitive in a post-legacy world.
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Multi-Rail Infrastructure: When RTP, Card Networks, and Blockchain Converge
Payment rails are no longer siloed systems. They now operate as an interoperable fabric where RTP networks, global card schemes, and blockchain-based settlement layers function side by side. FedNow crossed 1.8 billion monthly transactions by Q1 2026, and more than 70% of mid-market businesses now support at least two instant-payment rails. But the bigger shift is the normalization of multi-rail routing logic embedded directly into treasury systems.
ISO 20022 standardization finally reached critical mass. And with it, financial institutions can auto-route payments using rules that optimize for cost, certainty, or settlement speed. A growing share of cross-border B2B payments—about 14% in 2025 → projected 22% in 2026—move through blockchain settlement layers that provide deterministic finality instead of correspondent banking uncertainty.
The challenge is liquidity. As rails proliferate, treasury groups struggle to maintain capital efficiency. Automated liquidity management tools are improving, but most community banks still rely on fragmented systems that don’t speak the same data language.
Strategic Checklist
- Assess whether your RTP, FedNow, and card-network integrations support ISO 20022 natively rather than through middleware.
- Implement multi-rail routing rules based on cost-per-transaction analytics.
- Prioritize liquidity dashboards that consolidate intraday positions across rails.
Digital Assets Go Mainstream: CBDCs and Regulated Stablecoins in B2B
Digital assets shifted from speculative instruments to settlement tools inside regulated finance. And the clearest use case is B2B. Treasury desks now conduct high-value settlements using tokenized bank deposits, regulated USD stablecoins, and early-stage wholesale CBDCs.
By mid-2026, regulated stablecoins are projected to exceed $500B in annual B2B settlement volume, largely driven by supply-chain and marketplace payouts. Transaction finality within seconds—not days—reduces working capital friction by an estimated 21–28% for mid-cap firms using programmable settlement logic.
CBDCs remain experimental in the U.S. But pilots in Singapore, the EU, and the U.K. show credible results around cross-border efficiency and traceability. Regulators still debate privacy layers and interoperability. And that keeps adoption uneven.
The risk for community banks is strategic complacency. Large institutions are already tokenizing deposits and embedding smart-contract-based reconciliation. Community institutions that delay participation risk being locked out of emerging settlement networks.
Strategic Checklist
- Evaluate partnerships with regulated stablecoin issuers for B2B use cases.
- Explore deposit token pilots to modernize settlement without regulatory risk.
- Map CBDC readiness scenarios—even if U.S. adoption lags—so product roadmaps don’t fall behind global standards.
Agentic Commerce: Autonomous AI Agents as Financial Actors
Autonomous AI agents now operate inside procurement platforms, ERP systems, and digital storefronts. These agents don’t just recommend actions—they execute them. That includes initiating payments, adjusting liquidity, validating invoices, or managing credit-line utilization based on real-time market conditions.
By 2026, more than 35% of enterprise payments (McKinsey projection) will be initiated by agent-driven workflows rather than human-triggered actions. But the shift is less about automation and more about authorization. The critical innovation is agent identity and transaction-level permissions secured via cryptographic proofs.
Zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) now allow systems to validate that an AI agent is authorized to act—without exposing full account privileges. And that matters for fraud management. Institutions that embrace agentic commerce see reductions of 20–40% in exception handling because AI-driven systems validate counterparties, payment terms, and risk scores before execution.
The friction point: governance. Agent authorization frameworks remain inconsistent across platforms. Smaller financial institutions often lack standardized controls to integrate agent-based payments safely.
Strategic Checklist
- Adopt cryptographic identity verification for AI agents before enabling autonomous payments.
- Introduce policy-based transaction limits for agent-initiated transfers.
- Prioritize systems that generate audit-grade logs for every AI action and approval.
Digital Identity Wallets: Beyond Credentials to Verifiable Identity
Digital identity wallets are replacing the concept of a “payment credential.” Customers no longer carry cards or static account numbers in digital form. Instead, they present verifiable credentials tied to decentralized identifiers (DIDs), enabling banks to validate identity, risk attributes, and permissions in real time.
Self-sovereign identity (SSI) wallets already hold KYC attestations, business-entity proofs, and transaction reputation metrics. And this moves payments closer to identity-first authorization. Fraud rates on transactions that utilize verifiable credentials are 55–65% lower compared to password-based or device-based authentication.
Banks benefit from reduced onboarding overhead. A verified business identity wallet can reduce KYB onboarding times from weeks to minutes. But regulatory scrutiny is intense. Standards around revocation, data residency, and cross-jurisdiction identity proofs still lack global alignment.
Strategic Checklist
- Begin internal pilots with SSI wallets for KYC/KYB onboarding.
- Ensure your IAM stack can validate decentralized identifiers and verifiable credentials.
- Develop revocation and re-verification protocols before scaling customer use cases.
Embedded Finance Matures: From BaaS to Native Financial Experiences
Embedded finance shifted from outsourced BaaS partnerships to fully native financial experiences inside vertical SaaS platforms and marketplaces. Businesses no longer treat payments, lending, or treasury as separate workflows—they operate within the software tools they already use.
The sector crossed $140B in enterprise value in 2025 and continues to expand as underwriting models improve with real-time payment and identity data. Platforms with embedded financial services see 2–4x higher retention, and many now pursue direct bank partnerships rather than intermediary BaaS providers.
For community banks, this creates both opportunity and pressure. Direct integrations with vertical SaaS platforms open new deposit channels and credit opportunities. But legacy BaaS models that rely on batch processing and rigid compliance workflows are becoming obsolete.
Strategic Checklist
- Evaluate direct platform partnerships rather than intermediary BaaS providers.
- Modernize underwriting models using real-time payment and identity data.
- Build API-first products that allow platforms to integrate credit, payouts, and treasury functions natively.
Strategic Checklist for Community Banks and Credit Unions
- Modernize payment infrastructure to support interoperable multi-rail routing using ISO 20022 data.
- Establish a digital-asset settlement strategy for deposit tokens and regulated stablecoins.
- Prepare for agent-driven transactions with cryptographic agent identity.
- Adopt SSI-based digital identity tools for onboarding and transaction verification.
- Build embedded-finance capabilities through direct partnerships, not legacy BaaS intermediaries.
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