As digital payments, stablecoins and instant cross-border transactions reshape global finance, a fundamental question is emerging: how can countries preserve monetary sovereignty while retaining the ability to shape infrastructure and rules through which economies transact?
Across Africa and Asia, including ASEAN, governments and financial institutions are navigating the tension between greater financial connectivity and preserving monetary sovereignty. From Cambodia's efforts to promote greater use of the riel to Africa's expanding digital payment ecosystems and regional settlement ambitions, new payment infrastructure is challenging traditional currency dependencies while creating new forms of financial interdependence.
This panel examines whether digital financial integration can strengthen monetary sovereignty, reshape cross-border trade and rebalance economic and alter the balance between national autonomy and global integration.

Cross-border payments fail in different ways depending on the use case. QR payments may work domestically but stop at the border. Remittances can remain expensive even where digital channels are widely available. Trade settlement can still pass through third-country currencies and correspondent banks despite growing commercial links between emerging markets. The roundtable breaks the corridor problem into these separate channels and identifies what prevents each one from working today. It examines standards for extending QR interoperability, where remittance costs can realistically be removed, and what conditions are required for local-currency trade settlement.