Singapore has expanded its BLOOM cross-border payments initiative with the addition of Malaysia and Thailand as policymaker members. The Monetary Authority of Singapore confirmed on Friday that Bank Negara Malaysia and the Bank of Thailand have joined the program alongside existing participants including Ripple, Visa, Mastercard, Coinbase, JPMorgan and the World Bank Group.
BLOOM's Scope and Participants
BLOOM, which stands for Borderless, Liquid, Open, Online, Multi-currency, launched in October 2025 to coordinate work among regulators, financial institutions and technology companies on digital money settlement. The initiative focuses on regulated stablecoins and tokenized bank deposits as mechanisms for cross-border transfers.
Current commercial participants include payment networks Visa and Mastercard, cryptocurrency firm Ripple, remittance platform Airwallex, regional bank Maybank and fintech companies Coinbase and Stripe. JPMorgan and Standard Chartered also participate in the working group.
Testing Cross-Border Payment Systems
Ripple announced a trial in March with trade finance company Unloq to test automated payments using RLUSD on the XRP Ledger, with funds releasing when shipment conditions are met. Cross River Bank has separately added Ripple's RLUSD stablecoin to its payment system.
In related developments, JPMorgan made its JPM Coin deposit token available on Ethereum this week for approved institutional clients, representing the bank's digital deposit offering.
Central Bank Examination Areas
The participating central banks will examine several critical infrastructure elements for cross-border payments. These include:
- How institutions accept and exchange different digital currencies across borders
- Methods for payment systems to communicate without requiring separate bilateral agreements
- Identity verification and sanctions screening protocols
- Transaction monitoring and compliance controls
- Interoperability standards that reduce implementation costs while preserving national regulatory requirements
Regional Perspectives on Digital Money
Bank Negara Malaysia Deputy Governor Aznan bin Abdul Aziz stated that payments using different forms of digital money were becoming increasingly practical and welcomed cooperation between central banks and private sector participants.
Bank of Thailand Deputy Governor Daranee Saeju indicated that Singapore's initiative would support Thailand's development of regulations for tokenized money.
The expansion reflects growing interest among Southeast Asian regulators in standardizing cross-border digital payment infrastructure, though regulatory approaches continue to vary across markets. The World Bank Group's participation brings experience in international payment systems and financial inclusion to the initiative's work on business payments, corporate cash management and trade finance.
