Serving clients across borders means growth, but for most brokers, as players in a high-risk, high-stakes industry, this growth also comes with challenges. Payment orchestration is one of them. In its Quarterly Intelligence Report for Q1 2026, Finance Magnates notes that payment centralisation across traditional and emerging rails, including digital currencies, to reduce fragmentation, improve fraud detection, and unlock new revenue streams, remains a top priority for high-risk businesses.
As digitally savvy Gen Z investors and consumers dominate the markets, service providers such as brokers and iGaming companies are beginning to profile this type of customer: data-driven, financially literate, and no longer easy to please.
Often referred to as the ‘digital native generation’—growing up tablet in hand—Gen Z consumers are hyper-informed thanks to instant access to information. Consequently, they rarely make impulse purchases. Heavy research and thorough product and price comparisons precede any decision.
Used to living on a limited budget due to high inflation and global economic pressures, Gen Z-ers are extremely budget-conscious. According to a 2023 study conducted by Euromonitor, only 29% of Gen Z respondents were comfortable with their earnings.
At the same time, however, a lot of Gen Z-ers are inclined to live in the moment and splurge. This openness to experiential spending feeds into their payment behaviours and preferences for specific payment solutions. Payment providers like SPAYZ.io have paid attention.
Digital wallets and alternative payment solutions have engulfed a significant portion of the market share that not so long ago belonged to traditional players. According to a recent report by SPAYZ.io, this phenomenon is not isolated to a single region or country, spreading from Africa to Southeast Asia and from MENA to several developed European economies.
In Africa, for example, mobile money platforms like M-Pesa and OPay serve a largely unbanked young population, making small and frequent transactions.
In Southeast Asia, local e-wallets like GrabPay and real-time banks like PayNow—both popular in Singapore—share the market with instant bank transfer solutions such as PromptPay, a QR micropayment platform used in Thailand, and MoMo. Millennial mobile-first consumers are largely seen as the key promoters of mobile payments, contributing to their popularity in the region.
Despite an obvious shift in user behaviours and a cross-regional tendency towards digital, agile solutions, differences surface at a narrower local level, depending on jurisdiction and nuanced market needs. For instance, in a country like the Philippines, where only a meagre portion of the population (~50%) has a bank account, GCash rules, with a mobile wallet penetration of approximately 87%.
Comparatively, in a MENA country like the UAE, credit cards and mobile payments continue to lead, although a relatively high percentage of the population (~47%) prefer more ‘discreet’ options like prepaid cards and bank transfers due to the security they provide.
Lessons learnt
Regardless of the regional differences in payment behaviour, one thing holds true: slow, friction-heavy methods, including manual bank transfers, long checkout forms and certain workaround QR methods, are beginning to lose ground.
Regulatory tightening is broadly seen as the biggest risk. Countries like Turkey, Thailand, and Japan have tightened their rules for payments made to platforms considered high-risk. Sudden fund freezes, currency access challenges, and burdening FX rates compound.
Meanwhile, wallet-to-wallet transactions, biometrics, and localised rails are gaining in market share. Countries like Nigeria, Tanzania, Cameroon, Morocco and Mongolia are some of the strongest growth markets for these types of providers. Pakistan, Bangladesh and other countries in MENA and Central Asia are catching up.
As simplicity and convenience remain key satisfaction drivers, matching payment options to local habits becomes essential for businesses across industries. Eliminating all the unnecessary loopholes from payment cycles and reducing processing times is more important than ever.
Finance Magnates puts a similar idea forward. In its Q1 2026 Quarterly Intelligence Report, the news outlet showed that the FX and CFD account base grew to a record 7.4 million users in the first three months of the year. Most of this growth was concentrated in Southeast Asia and MEA markets, where card penetration was—and still is—relatively low compared to mobile money, QR code-based payments, and e-wallets.
Building a broker-first local payment stack
Against the backdrop of convenience and transaction speed, brokers must overhaul their payment stacks to stay relevant. Recent data places card acquisition at the bottom of the payment chain. Payment orchestration is only half of the solution.
The Finance Magnates Intelligence Report shows that new, more innovative payment rails are winning the client satisfaction game, outperforming legacy systems. AI-driven personalisation, frictionless checkout flows, proactive compliance checks via AI agents, and cybersecurity define the next generation of payment systems.
SPAYZ.io brings the best of both worlds. From payment orchestration to innovative local payment systems, its integrated payments platform continues to push the needle in high-risk industries like CFD trading and iGaming.
Designed for friction-free transaction processing, SPAYZ.io integrates bank transfers, online banking, e-wallets, mobile money, QR codes and mass payouts into a comprehensive ecosystem enabling brokers across Africa, Asia, and MENA to scale their operations by simply ‘plugging into’ its infrastructure.
Machine learning is a core component of SPAYZ.io’s payment architecture, ensuring high performance, smart routing, and real-time fraud detection. In an interview with Fintechview, CCO Tatjana Meluskane noted that “Trust is the currency of high-risk payments.” Maximum uptime and transparent settlement flows are crucial for brokers, handling seven-figure transaction volumes on a daily basis. That’s precisely what SPAYZ.io delivers.
Meet SPAYZ.io at iFX EXPO International 2026
With a solid footprint across 10+ countries spanning 4 continents, including Nigeria, Congo, Cameroon, Tanzania, the Philippines, and the UAE, SPAYZ.io will attend iFX EXPO International 2026, taking place between 16 and 18 June at City of Dreams Mediterranean in Limassol. The team will be stationed at booth 150, in Hall 2. Book a meeting in advance to secure a time slot with SPAYZ.
