Finance, Banking & Insurance

Singapore – October 21, 2026 -- BRAC Bank, one of Bangladesh's leading private commercial banks, has gone live with Finastra's Trade Innovation and Corporate Channels and Conpend's Trade AI solutions, replacing fragmented trade finance processes with a single integrated digital platform.

The bank moved to modernize its trade finance operations as trade volumes grow and customer expectations change. Its aims are higher efficiency and a scalable base for future growth. The platform is designed to raise straight-through processing and improve visibility across the trade finance lifecycle.

Platform targets ISO 20022 and Swift SR2026 compliance

The deployment is meant to speed up the rollout of new services while supporting compliance with evolving industry standards, including ISO 20022 and Swift SR2026 requirements.

New York – October 21, 2026 -- MoonPay, a crypto payments and stablecoin infrastructure company, is pursuing a strategic collaboration with Dunamu to build global financial infrastructure on digital assets, with stablecoin payments, corporate treasury management and Dunamu's GIWA blockchain as the three focus areas.

MoonPay and Dunamu target stablecoin cross-border payments and fund transfers

The two companies will jointly identify business opportunities in stablecoin-based global payments and fund movement. Drawing on both companies' technology and infrastructure, they will review cases in which digital assets can be used for cross-border payments and fund transfers. They will also examine the business potential of new financial service models.

Global – October 21, 2026 -- Capgemini identifies three data failures (fragmentation, stagnation and semantic inconsistency) as the main barrier keeping enterprise AI confined to pilots, particularly in financial services and other highly regulated industries.

Capgemini's Renjith Sreekumar says scaling problems lie in data, not models

Renjith Sreekumar, Head of Oracle Cloud & AI CoE for Financial Services at Capgemini, frames the issue as a shift from "does AI work?" to why it is so hard to scale. Early gains in analysis, content creation, workflow automation and customer experience remain limited to pilots, single functions or tightly controlled use cases.

Lafayette – October 21, 2026 -- Home Bancorp, Inc. (Nasdaq: HBCP) will replace John W. Bordelon, a 45-year veteran, as Chief Executive Officer of the company and Home Bank, N.A. on October 21, 2026, handing the role to President Darren E. Guidry.

Bordelon will remain Chairman and a director of both the holding company and the bank after he steps down as CEO. The board framed the arrangement as a way to support continuity during the leadership transition and afterward.

Guidry moves from President to CEO after joining in 1993

Guidry has served as President of the company and the bank since October 21, 2026. He will keep the President title when he assumes the CEO role. He joined the organization in 1993.

The company credits Guidry with a balanced approach to growth and risk management, with advancing its strategic priorities and with reinforcing its commitment to long-term shareholder value.

Lincoln – October 19, 2026 -- Ameritas is expanding advisor recruiting and business development through Ameritas Investment Company (AIC) and Ameritas Advisory Services (AAS), which together support more than 550 financial professionals and oversee $22.2 billion in customer assets.

AIC and AAS manage $13.7 billion in assets under management

As of Dec. 31, 2025, the two units held $13.7 billion in assets under management alongside the $22.2 billion in total customer assets. Financial Planning's IBD Elite 2026 survey ranked both firms among the nation's top 20 independent broker-dealers in wealth management by annual revenue.

Las Vegas – October 19, 2026 -- Coinbase will integrate Thunes' Direct Global Network for fiat payouts, while Thunes will run its stablecoin infrastructure on Coinbase's stablecoin solutions, the companies announced at Money20/20 USA.

Coinbase customers gain direct access to local clearing systems

Under the agreement, Coinbase will add Thunes' network to its platform. This gives it direct payout access to local clearing systems and alternative payment methods. Thunes will provide real-time last-mile delivery to mobile wallets and bank accounts, so Coinbase customers can send funds to more countries and currencies. The companies say this includes regions with limited banking infrastructure.

Thunes says its network operates in over 140 countries and more than 90 currencies.

Beijing – October 19, 2026 -- The 2026 Annual Conference of Financial Street Forum opened in Beijing with more than 400 guests from around the world, running four days under the theme of building an open, collaborative and inclusive ecosystem for global financial development.

Organizers frame the agenda around openness, cooperation and inclusiveness

Zeng Linfeng, executive secretary-general of the organizing committee's secretariat and acting head of Beijing's Xicheng district, told a pre-forum news conference that the theme reflects accelerating global change and mounting challenges for the world economy and global financial operations.

Zeng said the conference calls for better coordination of financial development and security, wider development space through opening-up, stronger systemic resilience through cooperation, and mutual benefits through an inclusive approach.

Bel Air – October 19, 2026 -- Harford Mutual Insurance Group's policyholders' surplus has grown from $89 million in 2006 to $489 million as of September 30, 2026, over the 20-year tenure of President and CEO Steven D. Linkous.

Linkous becomes third-longest-serving president in 1842 insurer's history

Linkous took the top job on October 16, 2006, as only the 10th president since the company was founded in 1842. Only John Carroll Walsh, who served 29 years, and Richard Dallam, who served 45 years, have led the company longer. Linkous joined HMIG in 1985 as a Microcomputer Programmer and Agency Support Specialist and also sits on the Board of Directors.

Chicago – October 19, 2026 -- Cboe Global Markets launched pre- and post-market trading in options on 24 single stocks and 5 ETFs on its Cboe Options Exchange (C1). Options on these names accounted for roughly 53% of average daily U.S.-listed options volume in 2026 through September.

Cboe opens two new sessions for equity and ETF options on C1

The pre-market session runs from 7:30 a.m. to 9:25 a.m. ET and the post-market session from 4:00 p.m. to 4:15 p.m. ET, Monday to Friday. C1 is currently the only U.S. options exchange offering pre- and post-market index options sessions. It is now extending extended-hours access to select single-stock and ETF options.

The covered underlyings include AAPL, AMZN, GOOG, GOOGL, META, MSFT, NVDA, TSLA and PLTR. The ETFs are SPY, QQQ, IWM, GLD and XLF. Cboe describes the group as including the Magnificent 10 stocks.

Las Vegas – October 19, 2026 -- Finastra launched StandbyX at Money 20/20, a cloud-enabled product that lets U.S. banks digitize standby letter of credit (SBLC) processing without deploying a full trade finance platform.

StandbyX targets regional and mid-sized banks still running manual SBLC workflows

Larger institutions typically handle SBLCs alongside broader trade finance operations on platforms such as Finastra's Trade Innovation. Many regional and mid-sized U.S. banks still rely on manual or semi-manual processes, which Finastra says create operational inefficiencies, increase risk and limit scalability.