At Money20/20 in Las Vegas, one question ran through every conversation: how do we make financial innovation work better for the people and businesses who rely on it? Here are three things that stuck with us after the discussions stopped.
Fraud is about intent, not just identity
Americans reported nearly $21 billion in internet crime losses to the FBI in 2025, up 26% from the previous year. For merchants, the daily crisis isn't one headline-grabbing technique. It's volume, sophistication, and speed, as automation turns fraud into a continuous test-and-learn cycle.
Blanket controls create problems of their own. Half of the enterprise businesses in Adyen's fraud report saw false declines rise last year, and every one is a double loss: the sale, plus the cost of acquiring a customer you then turn away.
Fraud is also concentrated: 5% of identities drive 58% of fraud value. But, while a fraudster can fake a face or a document, they can't fake years of genuine financial behavior. The answer is understanding intent across the entire customer journey, using AI to create a dynamic sliding scale between approving, asking for additional assurance, and blocking.
Platforms are best positioned to fund growth
Small businesses aren't struggling because they're failing. According to the Federal Reserve, 40% grew revenue last year and 56% expect to grow again. Yet 94% face financial challenges from uneven cash flows or credit availability, and when banks do approve a loan, 80% wait up to two weeks for funds.
As Adyen's Chief Risk and Compliance Officer, Mariëtte Swart, said on stage, "Traditional means of underwriting leave these smaller companies just invisible and underserved." Backward-looking statements miss what the software platform running a business's daily operations sees right now.
Fresha Capital serves as proof. Fresha's Chief Payments Officer, Pawel Iwanow, explained: "It's a click of a button, and the loan is approved. Why? Because of the data." One Las Vegas business used it to open a second location, and "it was all-on-platform within seconds." Today, 89% of borrowers return for a second loan.
Who owns the infrastructure matters
Most embedded finance relies on a web of partner banks. Every handoff adds complexity and delay, and when a sponsor bank changes its risk appetite, platforms inherit the disruption.
Owning the licenses changes that. Adyen sets its own risk appetite and control framework, holds a Federal Reserve master account in the US, and connects directly to real-time payment rails, including FedNow. Payments, accounts, card issuing, and capital run on a single stack, so businesses onboard once, and the same payment data used to process daily sales underwrites financing.
For Fresha, that meant launching capital in three weeks instead of three months, without a credit team or balance sheet liability. "We as a platform don't need to be a bank; Adyen needs to be one," said Iwanow.
The common thread
Whether the challenge is stopping fraud or funding growth, the winners will be the platforms and enterprises that own the underlying financial backend. The future isn't about slowing commerce down with higher hurdles. It's about unified infrastructure that gives teams total control over their money flows, while keeping the experience seamless for legitimate customers.
Discover how a complete financial operating system gives you the control and freedom to win the long game.
