Payment systems across the Middle East are handling heavier day to day volumes. Cards, wallets, instant transfers and government platforms all run across shared infrastructure, and expectations are uncompromising: payments must clear immediately, remain available and meet regulatory standards without interruption.
The year ahead will be defined less by new rails and more by how reliably existing systems perform as volumes rise across retail, government services, transport and cross border commerce. Those pressures concentrate in several parts of the ecosystem where load, risk and regulatory expectations now converge.
1. Fraud pressure follows real‑time adoption
Fraud across the region increasingly reflects authorised activity rather than technical compromise. Social engineering, impersonation scams and account takeover attempts have grown alongside instant transfers and wallet usage, where settlement leaves little time for recovery.
TransUnion’s Middle East Digital Fraud Trends Report 2025 showed authorised push payment fraud and account takeover attempts rising across several Gulf markets in line with real‑time payment adoption. That trajectory is expected to continue into 2026 as instant transfers and wallet usage expand and scams increasingly exploit customer behaviour more than technical compromise.
These incidents rarely stay within a single channel. Customers are often moved between cards, wallets and account‑based transfers within the same scam, exposing gaps where controls operate in isolation. Banks are therefore connecting fraud signals across systems rather than relying on transaction‑level checks.
Regulators are validating this direction. Supervisory guidance across GCC markets increasingly emphasises response time, customer treatment and auditability for real‑time payments, placing pressure on institutions to demonstrate coordinated fraud controls.
2. Automation becomes operational infrastructure
Automation already underpins fraud monitoring and payment operations across the region as transaction volumes rise. Fraud teams use automated behavioural analysis to prioritise alerts, while operations teams rely on similar tools to detect settlement issues, merchant anomalies and capacity stress. Platforms such as BPC SmartVista reflect how this is being operationalised in practice – AI-powered rules, list checks, behavioural profiling and ML scoring are brought together in a unified enterprise-grade platform, allowing institutions to respond to fraud and operational risk with greater speed and consistency across channels.
In 2026, the emphasis is governance rather than novelty. Automated decisions are expected to be explainable and defensible under regulatory review, reflecting a broader regional trend toward tighter oversight of digital payments as they become more closely tied to public services and national infrastructure. That is increasing the value of tools that teams can control directly, including no-code model lifecycle management, AI-driven rule suggestions based on emerging fraud patterns, and embedded assistants.
As real‑time and wallet‑based payments expand, automation has become a practical requirement for maintaining consistency and uptime, not a separate innovation track. The same applies beyond fraud. AI-enabled recommendation and virtual assistant tools are being used to analyse transaction behaviour, support reporting, retrieve operational data and help teams work more effectively with large datasets. In that sense, automation is no longer a narrow efficiency layer. It is becoming part of the operating fabric of the payments platform itself.
3. Modernisation runs alongside live systems
Payments modernisation across the Middle East is taking place while systems remain live. Most banks and switches operate multiple platforms in parallel, migrating volumes gradually while maintaining service continuity. Issuing and acquiring environments are expected to support traditional card programmes alongside wallets, QR payments and account‑to‑account schemes, creating pressure for consistent settlement, reporting and risk controls across payment types. This is already visible in current transformation programmes. In Jordan, Jordan Kuwait Bank signed a long-term agreement with BPC in February 2026 to unify its digital channels on a next-generation SmartVista platform, migrate its digital wallet and extend digital services for SMEs and merchants, including smartphone-based payment acceptance. The emphasis is not only on launching new services, but on doing so through a governed rollout designed to preserve business continuity and improve the consistency and reliability of digital banking services while the transition is under way.
The same pattern appears at national infrastructure level. In Ethiopia, EthSwitch has launched EthioPay-IPS on BPC’s SmartVista platform, connecting banks and licensed payment providers for 24/7 instant transfers, QR payments, alias-based payments and recurring collections. With dozens of banks, microfinance institutions and other payment participants already connected, the project shows how modern platforms are being used to add real-time capability, broader interoperability and centralised processing without destabilising existing payment connections.
Regional initiatives underline how much coordination is now required. National instant payment platforms such as the UAE’s Aani continue to expand transaction volumes while coexisting with established card and wallet ecosystems. Modern platforms are being used to add capacity, connect new participants and support regulatory change without destabilising heavily used services
4. Merchant acceptance exposes scale issues
Merchant payments are expanding rapidly across the region, supported by traditional terminals, SoftPOS and smartphone‑based acceptance tools. These models extend acceptance among SMEs and service providers, particularly in retail and hospitality. Industry data showsSoftPOS adoption accelerated through 2024 and 2025 as regulators approved contactless acceptance on consumer devices, lowering the cost of entry for smaller merchants.
At higher volumes, merchant environments expose operational weaknesses quickly. Onboarding controls, settlement accuracy and dispute handling become critical. In 2026, banks are treating merchant acceptance with the same discipline applied to core banking and payment rails.
5. Payments embedded into transport and public services
Payment systems across the Middle East are increasingly embedded into transport, tolling and municipal services. In several cities, commuters can already pay fares using standard bank cards or digital wallets rather than dedicated transit products. Regional transport authorities continue to expand open‑loop acceptance as part of wider mobility programmes.
Digital fare collection is already in use across the region. In Ajman, O‑CITY by BPCsupports a unified bus fare system that reduces cash handling and gives the transport authority clearer visibility of usage. In Saudi Arabia, SAPTCO has used O-CITY by BPC as part of its digital transformation to introduce account-based ticketing, open-loop payments, closed-loop card acceptance, QR payments and city-branded mobile apps across multiple cities. By allowing open-loop and closed-loop models to operate on the same platform, the programme has supported a more gradual transition for both operators and passengers as digital fare collection expands. Egypt’s national railway, ENR, has taken a similar approach, with electronic ticketing now supporting high‑volume rail journeys.
These environments place specific demands on payment infrastructure. Volumes peak at predictable times, transaction values are low and outages are immediately visible. When transport payments fail, the impact extends beyond banking into daily life.
Where pressure will sit through 2026
Across the Middle East, payment systems are being judged less as banking products and more as part of national digital infrastructure. The expectations influencing 2026 are practical ones: systems must stay available under load, signals must move cleanly between channels, and institutions must show they can respond quickly when something goes wrong.
The operators that make the most progress this year will be those that treat visibility, platform discipline and operational resilience as everyday work rather than project language. The region’s growth in commerce, mobility and public services depends on payment systems that run predictably, not on new announcements. In 2026, credibility will come from how well these systems perform when volumes rise and when customers move between channels without noticing the machinery underneath.
Usama ElSayed is Managing Director Middle East and Africa at BPC
