While traditional financial institutions adapt to macroeconomic turbulence by updating client services, part of the market demonstrates a different approach to resilience through the flexibility of technological architecture. About the key trends shaping the financial infrastructure of 2026, in the commentary of fintech expert Artem Lyashanov.
The gap between the facade and the architecture
According to Artem Lyashanov, the cosmetic update of interfaces, which today limits the digitalization of many banks, does not eliminate the main problem, the gap at the level of infrastructure layers. The market is increasingly actively moving towards an on-chain economy, where assets exist in the form of digital tokens and are moved through the blockchain almost instantly.
Neobanks and fintech platforms, in his opinion, are taking market share precisely where large players are the slowest to update their technological base, due to accumulated technical debt and monolithic systems.
AI is moving into the infrastructure category
The fintech market is moving from the phase of active user engagement to the phase of maturity, and artificial intelligence is becoming the main tool of this transition. According to the analytical company, by the end of 2025, more than 70% of financial institutions will have already used AI on an industrial scale, which is more than twice the figure for 2023.
Commenting on these data, Artem Lyashanov noted that for fintech players it is no longer a question of competitive advantage. The implementation of AI is becoming a basic condition for participation in the market.
Among the areas where the application of AI gives the most tangible effect:
- Automation of internal operations and customer service;
- Real-time transaction analysis to detect fraud;
- Forecasting customer churn;
- Personalization of financial products.
A separate block of Artem Lyashanov commentary concerned the development of open financial standards. He distinguishes two stages.
Open Banking – authorized access of third-party services to the client’s banking data through secure APIs.
Open Finance – the extension of this principle to insurance, investments and other financial products.
According to him, open standards change the very logic of financial services, transforming disparate products into a single seamless user experience. The speed with which new standards can be implemented in local markets will depend primarily on how modular the technological infrastructure is already built today.
Ukrainian experience of resilience
Artem Lyashanov separately drew attention to the interest in the Ukrainian experience of building financial systems in conditions of increased uncertainty. It is not about unique technologies, but about the approach: solutions designed with instability in mind, as a rule, better withstand ordinary market shocks.
Speaking about the prospects for the coming years, he described the vector of industry development as the gradual dissolution of financial services in the daily actions of the user – when processes based on Open Finance and autonomous AI work in the background, without the need for a separate interface for each operation.
Reference
Artem Lyashanov is a fintech expert who comments on trends in the development of digital financial infrastructure, the implementation of artificial intelligence in financial services, and the development of open data standards.
Source of statistical data: Gartner (via analytical material Crowdfund Insider, 2026).
