Helping clients expand overseas
According to McKinsey’s article “CEO imperatives in Asia’s new era”, businesses in Asia are advancing quickly, with many regional players scaling their operations globally—bringing with them a unique set of challenges. Companies in high-growth sectors such as e-commerce, manufacturing, and technology are facing increasingly complex regulatory, liquidity, and operational issues as they scale across borders. To succeed in new markets, businesses require real-time insights to understand customer behaviour and trends, alongside predictive analytics to navigate regulatory complexities and optimise working capital.
Leading financial institutions are stepping up by introducing open application programming interfaces (APIs) for managing payments, launching modular platforms that integrate multiple transaction capabilities, broadening payment rail access, and forging partnerships with fintech firms to expand service offerings. But the most forward-looking firms are also providing data-driven insights that help clients not only move money, but move smarter.
Regulatory compliance and the shift toward embedded finance are opening up new opportunities for financial institutions. Automation of compliance processes and the use of data analytics are being leveraged to monitor transactions, flag anomalies, and ensure transparency. Meanwhile, the increasing importance of data analytics as a strategic asset is encouraging businesses to adopt advanced toolkits for identifying risks, benchmarking performance, and uncovering growth opportunities.
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Despite the wide range of use cases, many organisations continue to face challenges in unlocking the full value of data analytics. Fragmented systems, data silos, and incompatible formats often hinder a unified view for actionable insights and smart decision-making. Furthermore, many businesses still rely on traditional, backwards-looking analytics that fall short of supporting proactive, predictive and prescription capabilities that can help to identify risks and guide decisions.
Capturing opportunities with the help of data analytics
Organisations are increasingly looking to their payments service providers for actionable insights driven by data analytics. At BNY, for example, our data insights inform clients across a wide range of business functions—from behavioural analysis to liquidity optimisation—helping them navigate new markets and capture growth opportunities. With an end-to-end infrastructure supporting data hosting, analysis, and insight delivery, we help streamline cross-border payments and improve the overall experience for stakeholders.
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Below are real-world use cases that demonstrate how organisations can harness data and analytics to enhance the cost efficiency of FX conversions, manage cash better, and improve payment efficiency.
FX optimisation: Enhancing cost efficiency
Organisations making international payments often face inefficiencies in downstream FX conversions. For example, one corporate entity sending USD payments to Indonesia and the Philippines identified cost-saving opportunities by benchmarking conversion rates. Through proactive FX optimisation, the business was able to convert earlier, improve Straight-Through Processing (STP) rates, and accelerate credit delivery to beneficiaries. This demonstrates how insights from analytics can inform actionable strategies and reduce unnecessary costs.
Intraday liquidity insights: Smarter cash management
Liquidity management continues to be a key challenge for corporations operating on a global scale. One organisation struggling with idle cash reserves and overdrafts leveraged intraday analytics to gain real-time visibility into liquidity positions. Automated payment recommendations and alerts for risk thresholds enabled smarter funding decisions across regions, optimising liquidity utilisation and minimising inefficiencies.
Improving payment efficiency: Tackling operational bottlenecks
Manual processes and payment failures often disrupt international transactions. One global exporter, for example, faced recurrent failures in USD payments to Latin America, leading to inefficiencies and added costs. By analysing payment data through dashboards, the business identified specific failure points, improved reconciliation workflows, and introduced automation tools like pre-validation and template standardisation. These measures reduced errors and significantly enhanced operational efficiency, underscoring the importance of analytics-driven automation.
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What’s next: From insight to innovation
As Asia continues to rise as a global economic force, the ability to make agile, data-informed decisions across borders will define organisations’ competitive advantage. Regulatory scrutiny, geopolitical uncertainty, and shifting supply chains will only increase the need for insight-driven treasury functions. The future of cross-border finance lies not just in faster infrastructure, but in predictive intelligence.
Whether through FX optimisation, liquidity analytics, or automation solutions, businesses can leverage data analytics to remain agile when adapting to market challenges and position themselves for long-term growth and resilience in a rapidly evolving world.
Fabian Khoshbakht is the head of Treasury Services for Apac and global head of Client Insight and Innovation at BNY
