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One of the keynote’s most striking messages was that people are remarkably poor at identifying AI-generated content. Drawing on research conducted by his team, Farid said participants shown a mix of genuine and AI-generated images, audio clips and videos performed only slightly better than random chance when asked to distinguish between them. “We’ve trained them. We’ve explained to them how this works. They’re basically at chance.”

More concerning was that participants’ confidence bore little relationship to their accuracy. “The only thing that’s worse than this is there’s almost no correlation between their confidence and their accuracy. People who think they’re good at it are bad.”

From: UC Berkeley professor: ‘Things are getting weird’, even Mitch McConnell photos aren’t being trusted.

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Money 20/20 in Amsterdam saw the official launch of UK Payments Initiative (UKPI) backed by the country’s biggest banks with the explicit aim of chipping away at the dominance of US card networks in UK payments.

Barclays, NatWest, Lloyds and HSBC are among the major lenders behind the FCA-regulated scheme, which is designed to accelerate adoption of account-to-account payments that bypass card rails entirely.

From: Have The Card Networks’ Grip Just Got Looser?.

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In this respect I agree with the economist Tyler Cowen, who said in a recent podcast that “I don’t think of crypto as a currency. I think of it as a new set of institutions”. If these institutions can reduce the costs of financial intermediation (largely by reducing the costs of regulation, compliance and auditing) then they will make a very significant contribution to improving the lives of all.

From: Crypto is new instruments and institutions, not new money.

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A small group of traders may have pulled $8.2 million out of Polymarket’s popular bitcoin markets by nudging the spot price on Binance in the seconds before each bet settled, researchers at Stanford University and Singapore Management University suggest in a working paper published this week.

From: Polymarket Traders May Be Manipulating Bitcoin’s Price To Rig Bets, Stanford Study Says – Unchained.

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Transactions on a new China-led digital currency platform have surged to over $55 billion, a new report shows, the latest sign that efforts to build alternatives to dollar-dependent global payment systems are ​gaining traction.
Data crunched by the Washington-based Atlantic Council showed the prototype ‘mBridge’ platform, which is being tested by central banks in China, Hong Kong, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, had now processed more than 4,000 cross-border transactions.

From: China-led cross-border digital currency platform sees surge | Reuters.

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I am not saying that because as crypto-assets aren’t currencies they are not useful. Quite the contrary. In this respect I agree with the economist Tyler Cowen, who said in a recent podcast that “I don’t think of crypto as a currency. I think of it as a new set of institutions”.

From: (34) Crypto is new instruments and institutions, not new money.

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Digital public infrastructure, such as IndiaStack, is gaining momentum – particularly in

developing countries without heavy legacy systems. International bodies such as the

G20 and the United Nations increasingly see this infrastructure as a way to support

inclusion and growth.

From: FCA Horizon Scan 2026.

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Kalshi’s own surveillance system caught something a human compliance team almost certainly wouldn’t have: a pattern of “off” trades on its Mentions markets, the contracts where users bet on which specific words or phrases a public figure will say in a speech. According to CBS News, a Kalshi spokesperson said the company investigated the trader’s activity after its surveillance systems detected trades that didn’t adhere to typical buying and selling patterns.
That trader has since been identified by multiple outlets, including Axios and CNBC, as Gabriel Perez, Trump’s teleprompter operator since 2016, someone with literal advance access to the text of the speeches being bet on.

From: The Prediction Market Insider Trading Problem.

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Western Union has launched its stablecoin wallet and card in partnership with Visa and Rain.

Stablecard will launch in Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, and the Philippines, with plans to expand access in the coming months, providing users with a way to receive funds and store value in US dollars in a secure wallet, and spend seamlessly anywhere Visa is accepted

From: Western Union launches stablecard.

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Alongside the carnê, the boleto bancário became a cornerstone of commerce.

As a bank-issued payment slip, boleto enabled consumers, including the underbanked, to pay bills and make purchases without a credit card. For years, it played a critical role in the expansion of e-commerce by bridging the gap between cash and digital transactions.

From: Brazil’s favorite payment method: Pix, credit cards, or digital wallets? | Payments.

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