XTransfer, a B2B cross-border financial platform, had Neil Ni, have its chief strategy officer, speak at the Inclusive FinTech Forum 2026 in Rwanda, underscoring the company’s growing expansion across Africa to deliver more inclusive financial services for SMEs engaged in international trade across the continent.
Neil joined the panel discussion, “Securing the Global Payments Highway: Cybersecurity for Real-Time Cross-Border Transactions” during the forum to share perspectives on how the industry can strengthen cybersecurity, anti-money laundering (AML) controls, and operational resilience as cross-border payments scale in speed and volume.
Drawing on XTransfer’s experience supporting SMEs in international trade, Neil noted that traditional B2B cross-border payments often pass through multiple correspondent banks, creating complex procedures, settlement delays and high costs that can strain SME cash flow.
He shared that transfers can take several days to settle, and fees can materially impact businesses operating on tight margins, sometimes pushing SMEs toward unlicensed channels that raise compliance and transparency risks.
“As the industry scales, the challenge isn’t only transaction volume, it’s speed and trust,” Neil said. “To keep legitimate trade moving safely, risk and compliance must become more intelligent, consistent, and scalable.”
Neil shared that AI is now foundational to XTransfer’s risk and compliance capability. He highlighted TradePilot, XTransfer’s self-developed large language model (LLM) tailored for the global foreign trade financial sector, which helps identify suspicious patterns earlier, prioritise alerts, reduce false positives, and support more consistent decisions across markets, strengthening AML and compliance at speed.
Neil also discussed XTransfer’s accelerating expansion in Africa, noting more than 300% growth in the region in 2025 as SMEs seek faster and lower-cost ways to manage cross-border trade payments.
He added that XTransfer is focused on working with ecosystem partners and regulators to support safer, more standardised cross-border information flows, one reason XTransfer is building X-Net, the industry’s first Unified Global B2B Trade Settlement Network and Risk Control Platform, to enhance interoperability and shared security standards across payment rails.
“Building resilience requires collective effort,” Neil added.
