The NextGen Payments & RegTech Forum will bring banks, fintechs and regulators together in Dubai as the UAE's rapid shift toward instant payments puts greater pressure on fraud prevention and financial controls. 

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Dubai will host the NextGen Payments & RegTech Forum on October 8, bringing together banks, fintechs, payment companies and regulators for a discussion around some of the issues now shaping the UAE's payments sector. 

Organized by QUBE Events, the forum at Kempinski Central Avenue will cover real-time and cross-border payments, fraud, AML and KYC, AI and digital assets. More than 50 speakers are scheduled to participate, including representatives from Mastercard, ACI Worldwide, Chainalysis, Mashreq and the Central Bank of the UAE.

The event comes as the UAE's instant payments infrastructure has moved well beyond its early rollout. Aani, the national instant payments platform operated by Al Etihad Payments, passed 12.5 million registered users in April and was connected to 74 licensed financial institutions, according to figures published by the Central Bank of the UAE. The platform had also reached about 774,000 merchants, while account-to-account transfers were being completed in an average of three seconds.  

Faster Payments, New Demands 

For financial institutions, faster payments leave less room for traditional checks once a transaction is underway. Fraud detection, customer verification and transaction monitoring increasingly have to work alongside payment systems that can move money in seconds. The forum's focus on scams, mule accounts, continuous KYC and risk-based onboarding reflects that shift, particularly as banks and payment providers work to strengthen controls without creating unnecessary delays for legitimate transactions. 

AI is becoming part of that work as well. The event will include discussions around automated payment processing and AI governance, including model risk and audit trails. Financial institutions are using software to handle more of the work involved in screening and monitoring transactions, but those systems still need oversight and documentation when decisions have regulatory or financial consequences. 

Digital assets will also feature, with sessions covering stablecoins, tokenized deposits and regulated on and off-ramps. The subject has become increasingly relevant in the UAE as regulators establish rules for virtual asset businesses while companies explore ways to connect digital assets with existing financial services. 

Recent developments show some of those connections already taking shape. Emirates announced in July that eligible UAE residents could use Crypto.com Pay to purchase flights through its website and mobile app.  

A similar development came through the partnership between mb.io and Botim, which allows users to fund their mb.io accounts through Botim. Both examples point to digital asset services being integrated into more familiar financial and consumer platforms, bringing questions around payments and crypto into the same conversations around regulation, security and user experience. 

The October forum is therefore arriving at a useful point for the sector. The UAE has already built much of the infrastructure needed for faster payments, while banks and fintechs are now working through the consequences of that speed, including how to identify fraud quickly, govern automated systems and accommodate newer forms of digital money within regulated financial services. 

The NextGen Payments & RegTech Forum takes place on October 8 at Kempinski Central Avenue in Dubai.  

More information and registration details are available on the QUBE Events website 

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