1. Visa completes first commercial cVRP A2A transaction in the UK
On 19 November, Visa announced that Kroo Bank, Utilita and Tink had completed the first commercial variable recurring payment (cVRP) using its Visa A2A solution in the UK, demonstrating an energy bill payment to Utilita.¹ This builds on work by Tink and others to show how cVRP can support real-time, recurring account-to-account (A2A) payments with immediate confirmation and clearer reconciliation for billers.² ³
The transaction runs over Faster Payments and is framed as combining the efficiency of A2A with a dispute and protection model closer to card schemes’ established frameworks.¹ ³
Asima’s view
Visa’s live A2A cVRP payment is a welcome sign that variable recurring flows are moving beyond pilots, but the real scaling pathway is the industry-owned scheme now being built for commercial VRPs. Under the model developed by Frontier Economics for Open Banking Limited, a new independent operator, funded by 31 banks, PSPs and fintechs (including Wonderful Payments Ltd) will run a standardised Multi-Lateral Agreement (MLA) and commercial framework for Wave 1 cVRPs, initially focused on low-risk, regulated sectors such as utilities, rail, government, charities and regulated financial services.⁴ ⁵ ⁶ ⁷
The public “commercial model for cVRP – Wave 1” sets out per-transaction fees in the 3p–11p range, payable by PISPs under the MLA.⁶ ⁷ That range is designed to cover both the ASPSP’s costs and the scheme / Operator component, including the central “scheme fee” for running the neutral operator, dispute processes and shared services.⁶ ⁷ This is the right direction: a transparent, scheme-grade model that can support competition and long-term investment across the ecosystem, rather than a patchwork of bilateral arrangements.
For Asima and our clients, the implications are clear:
- Treat VRP as a distinct product with its own consent, liability and dispute frameworks.
- Design mandates, telemetry and audit trails to align first with the UK industry scheme and MLA operator, then with card-scheme overlays such as Visa A2A.
- Plan for VRPs to become materially more visible across UK e-commerce through the 2025–26 window, in line with public signals from regulators and Open Banking Limited.⁴ ⁵ ⁶
2. Klarna announces dollar-backed stablecoin KlarnaUSD
On 25 November, Klarna confirmed plans to launch KlarnaUSD, a US dollar-backed stablecoin intended to cut the cost and friction of cross-border and everyday payments.⁸ ⁹ The token will run on Tempo, a payments-focused blockchain developed by Stripe and Paradigm, and is initially being tested ahead of a planned mainnet launch in 2026.³ ⁸
Klarna positions KlarnaUSD as fully backed by US-dollar reserves and designed to provide a faster, cheaper alternative to legacy correspondent banking systems and card-based cross-border flows.⁸ ⁹ The move brings one of Europe’s largest BNPL firms into the same stablecoin conversation as PayPal, Stripe and others, at a time when regulatory frameworks such as the US GENIUS Act and the EU’s MiCA are starting to take shape.³ ⁹
Asima’s view
Stablecoins are increasingly being framed as payments products, not speculative instruments. For infrastructure providers rooted in open banking, this raises practical questions:
- How do you orchestrate flows where some legs are on bank rails and others on tokenised cash?
- How do you present FX, settlement risk and disclosure cleanly to merchants and consumers?
- How do you ensure that on-chain balances and bank-account balances can be reconciled and audited to the standard expected by regulators?
We expect to see more PSPs and large fintechs treating stablecoins as an overlay on top of existing domestic and cross-border infrastructure rather than a wholesale replacement, and open-banking platforms will need to interoperate with that reality.
3. FCA outlines its approach to cryptoassets and stablecoins
On 26 November, David Geale, the FCA’s Executive Director for Payments and Digital Finance (and PSR Managing Director), delivered a speech setting out the regulator’s evolving approach to cryptoassets and stablecoins.¹⁰ ¹¹
Key themes included:
- The FCA’s objective to support a trusted, competitive and innovative crypto and stablecoin market, rather than prohibit it.¹⁰
- An acknowledgment that crypto ownership in the UK has become more mainstream, with millions of consumers having some exposure and average holdings in the low-thousands of pounds.¹⁰ ¹¹
- The FCA’s existing role supervising crypto firms for AML/CTF and financial promotions, and its move into a fuller regime for stablecoin issuance, custody and prudential requirements, with further consultations expected on market abuse, disclosure, consumer duty and reporting.¹⁰ ¹¹
Asima’s view
For infrastructure providers, the message is that digital-money regulation is crystallising, not fading. If you intend to touch stablecoins or tokenised deposits in the UK, you will need:
- Clear governance around custody, segregation and reconciliation of funds.
- Transparent disclosure of where consumer protections apply and where they do not.
- An architecture capable of giving regulators line-of-sight into flows, not just static snapshots.
Many of the controls already required of UK-authorised payment institutions and AIS/PIS providers - safeguarding governance, operational resilience, data lineage - are directly reusable in a future tokenised-money stack. That is where Asima is naturally positioned.
4. JNFX enters special administration: a reminder on safeguarding and failure regimes
On 24 November, the FCA announced that JNFX Ltd, an FCA-authorised payment institution specialising in FX and corporate payments, had entered special administration under the Payment and Electronic Money Institution Insolvency Regulations 2021.¹² Joint special administrators from Azets were appointed by the High Court, and the firm has ceased trading while its operations and safeguarding arrangements are assessed.¹² ¹³
The FCA reiterated that:
- JNFX remains authorised, but its permissions are now subject to restrictions set out by the court and administrators.¹²
- The Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) does not apply to payment services, so customers rely on the firm’s compliance with safeguarding requirements.¹²
- Administrators will review which funds qualify as safeguarded and aim to return them “as soon as reasonably practicable”.¹² ¹³
Asima’s view
This case underlines why governance and safeguarding are as important as innovation:
- Clients should understand exactly how their provider segregates and safeguards customer money, and what the failure regime looks like.
- Providers must be able to evidence reconciliations, safeguarding controls and governance rapidly if things go wrong.
- For embedded-payments and marketplace models, counterparty selection should balance pricing with resilience and clarity on how a wind-down would operate in practice.
For Asima, these themes are not abstract: our infrastructure and partner choices are built around long-term resilience and operational transparency, not just feature parity.
¹ Visa. First Visa A2A transaction completed in the UK with partners Kroo Bank, Utilita and Tink. 19 November 2025. Link
² Tink. The UK’s first cVRP transaction with Visa A2A. 20 November 2025. Link
³ Finextra. Visa completes first recurring A2A transaction in the UK. 19 November 2025. Link
⁴ Open Banking Limited. Firms agree to fund key activities to create new company to deliver the initial phase of work for commercial variable recurring payments. 2 May 2025. Link
⁵ FinTech Futures. UK financial industry players to fund operator for commercial VRPs. 6 May 2025. Link
⁶ Open Banking Limited / Frontier Economics. The commercial model for cVRP Wave 1 (PDF). 9 April 2025. Link
⁷ Acquired.com. The cVRP commercial model: balancing adoption and sustainability. 17 April 2025. Link
⁸ Reuters. Klarna to launch dollar-backed stablecoin as race in digital payments heats up. 25 November 2025. Link
⁹ Financial Times. Klarna launches stablecoin to cut cost of cross-border payments. 25 November 2025. Link
¹⁰ Financial Conduct Authority. The FCA’s approach to regulating cryptoassets and stablecoins – speech by David Geale. 26 November 2025. Link
¹¹ Linklaters. UK/EU fintech and payments regulation update – December 2025 (summary of FCA cryptoassets and stablecoins speech). 2 December 2025. Link
¹² Financial Conduct Authority. JNFX Ltd enters special administration. 24 November 2025. Link
¹³ Azets. Special Administrators of JNFX Ltd. 25 November 2025. Link
