Singapore-Thailand payment linkage sets Southeast Asia's digital economy alight

The successful linkage of Singapore and Thailand’s Real-Time-Payment (RTP) systems, PayNow and PromptPay, marks not just a world’s first in cross-border payments, but also a major milestone in realising the potential of Southeast Asia’s digital economy.

With the value of international payments expected to reach US$156 trillion ($208 trillion) in 2022, cross-border payments are a crucial interlocker of global connectivity.

This is particularly important as the digital economy takes a more prominent role — and no more so than in Southeast Asia where, in 2020, 40 million people came online for the first time.