Bank Negara Malaysia and the Bank of Thailand have joined Singapore’s BLOOM initiative as policymaker members. The October 23, 2026 announcement expands cooperation on accepting, exchanging and settling digital money across borders.
TL;DR
- Malaysia and Thailand join Singapore as policymaker members.
- Work covers different forms of digital money and their interoperability.
- The initiative is developing frameworks for use across markets.
Making different payment systems work together
The Monetary Authority of Singapore also named new participants including Airwallex, Mastercard, Maybank, Nium, Ripple, Visa and the World Bank Group. The work spans payments, corporate treasury and trade finance.
The BLOOM programme page describes a public-private initiative covering G10 and Asian currencies, tokenized commercial-bank money and stablecoins that meet regulatory expectations. Its focus includes acceptance and settlement, interoperability between systems and programmable controls such as identity checks and sanctions screening.
These are related but separate problems. Moving a digital record between networks does not itself establish that the receiving institution accepts the asset, that the sender has met local requirements or that the commercial obligation has been discharged. A useful cross-border arrangement needs all three questions answered for the same transaction.
A business paying a supplier provides a straightforward example. Both sides need to know the payment asset, the amount that will arrive and the point at which the invoice is considered paid. Shared technical standards help, but the surrounding agreements must also describe who handles a failed or disputed transfer.
Building on earlier work in programmable money
BLOOM builds on Project Orchid. MAS’s earlier Orchid material describes exploratory work on digital Singapore dollars and their interaction with existing infrastructure. One strand examined purpose-bound money: a protocol that attaches conditions to the use of an underlying digital currency.
The historical programme included an e-commerce escrow pilot in which payment could be released after delivery, as well as work on institutional payment controls and wallet interoperability. Those examples show how a condition can be connected to a transfer. They do not establish that a common cross-border operating framework is already complete.
BLOOM’s current scope also includes exploring payments executed by AI agents within predefined limits and safeguards. The practical question is how a system verifies that a proposed action fits the permission it was given before money moves.
For example, a purchasing agent could be authorised to pay a specified supplier up to an agreed amount. Checking the supplier, the amount and the triggering event are distinct tasks. Making those checks consistent across participating institutions would be an implementation achievement in its own right. The next useful evidence will be published frameworks and concrete trial results showing how the participating systems interact.
Written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
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