Time for a Reset in Money Movement and Management

The global payments industry processed a staggering 3.4 trillion transactions in 2023, accounting for $1.8 quadrillion in value, and generating $2.4 trillion in revenues. With annual growth of 7% from 2018 to 2023, it’s no wonder financial institutions are racing to capture a bigger share of this market.[1]

However, for too long, existing and new entrants to the money movement and management market have been underserved by the vendor community. Many players are facing internal capability roadblocks as external competition intensifies, and much of this boils down to unnecessary complexity in system landscapes.

While some complexity is inherent to the scale and demands of the business, choices in technologies, overreliance on in-house developments and resources, and enforced diversity of sourcing have become real threats to future progress and success.

As payment volumes have continued to soar, so have customers’ expectations. Speed, transparency, reliability, and lower costs are now baseline requirements. But for financial institutions relying on a patchwork of different systems, some of which may be classed as legacy, meeting these expectations isn’t always easy – or even possible.

To understand the need for change, it’s helpful to know how we got here.

Undoing technical debt to drive growth

It’s fair to assume that most institutions didn’t plan to have overly complex technology systems and operations. By introducing solutions reactively over time – building, buying, and integrating as needed – they have met short-term needs successfully but left a sprawling footprint of technical debt that is both costly and time consuming to manage.

This is a huge drain on resources.

Teams are often stuck maintaining slow and fragile systems instead of improving customer experiences or launching new services. Innovation is stalling because they are spending nearly all their time managing this infrastructure with multiple, complex integrations, as well as continuous regulatory mandates, instead of a laser focus on seizing market opportunities. And as a result, operational excellence is far from its full potential, particularly in areas like straight-through processing and customer updating to support the needs of the attention economy.

The good news is that this type of complexity can be overcome (or avoided, depending on the maturity of your business).

Turning commodity services into differentiators

Many players are realizing that they need a much more efficient approach; one with ready-to-go functionality for essential services like account-to-account payments, account servicing, risk management, and treasury. An all-in-one money movement and management platform that provides these “core” capabilities as configurable commodity services, with the flexibility to adapt as needed.

But this is only part of the story; staying compliant and secure is equally critical.

New threats and tougher regulatory standards are making it harder for institutions to keep up, particularly for those with complex and diverse operations.

One example of changing standards is the rollout of ISO 20022 for SWIFT cross-border payments and reporting, with the major deadline for the end of the transition period around the corner in November 2025. This continues to drive demand for solutions with native ISO 20022 capabilities across payments, accounts, and customer data processes.

Meanwhile, with increasing sophistication, cybercrime is in many ways becoming harder to detect, even with advanced tools. There is the added pressure of executing these detection processes as we move to more real time, 24×7 cross border, putting businesses and customers at heightened risk.

So, the need – and appetite – for change is clear.

It’s time to remove the barriers created by in-house, platforms that almost entirely rely on internal manpower for ongoing development and value. To refocus these resources on customer-facing innovation and value-added services that drive revenue, protect the business, and maximize excellence across the board.

Crucially, it’s time for security and resilience to be embedded across money movement operations so that customers are not just satisfied, but delighted, and both organizations and customers are safeguarded, in today’s competitive market.

Whether you’re an established or new player, the world of money movement and management is becoming more demanding, with change driven by the need for growth through innovation, regulatory compliance, optimized services, and advanced business and customer protections.
That’s why Temenos has created a solution that can handle the key requirements of today’s money movement and management industry.

Combining payments, accounts, risk and treasury on a single, open, API-first integrated platform, it enables money servicing businesses to deliver resilient, faster, and smarter propositions to anyone, anywhere, anytime.

[1] https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/financial-services/our-insights/global-payments-in-2024-simpler-interfaces-complex-reality