Solutions Engineer

Access is the new advantage: what Southeast Asia's next chapter of payments innovation demands. 6 mins read At the ASEAN Tech Summit in Manila this July, Ina Gatan, Head of GTM Philippines at Xendit, attended sessions on the region's first digital economy agreement and what its implementation will require of businesses across Southeast Asia. The Summit convened under the theme "Building ASEAN's Digital Economy: Secure. Sustainable. Inclusive. Borderless." Trade officials, ASEAN-BAC representatives from five member states, and the Department of Trade and Industry set out the region's position months before the ASEAN Digital Economy Framework Agreement (DEFA) is signed in November. Ina's key takeaways: * Why the region's regulatory agenda has converged on access, and what that means for businesses operating here * How the BSP's new pricing rules expose a tension between widening access and funding the infrastructure that delivers it * Why financial inclusion has become an operating condition for every consumer-facing business in ASEAN The room where it's happening. I have been a fan of the musical Hamilton for years, and one of my favourite songs from it is "The Room Where It Happens." Aaron Burr sings it from outside a closed door while Alexander Hamilton and two other men divide the future of a country, creating a gap between themselves and the very people they promise to serve. In it, power belongs to whoever controls entry to that room. The Summit flipped that premise on its head. For two days, the trends and insights of Southeast Asia's digital economy were set out on stage, in front of the very businesses those terms will govern. With DEFA set to be signed in November, the room is open, and what is said inside it is meant to be heard by all. The question the Summit was really addressing was access: How do Xendit Inc. priorotise inclusion in a payments ecosystem as varied and diverse as Southeast Asia? Five-dollar baskets leave no margin for a failed payment. DTI Secretary Cristina Roque's keynote set out the trajectory. The Philippine digital economy GMV grew from $26 billion in 2023 to $36 billion in 2025, with projections between $70 and $140 billion by 2030. The figure that struck me the most was average order value: $4.50 to $5.50 per transaction. A billion transactions a year at five dollars each is a market built on breadth. It also leaves no tolerance for failure. A customer whose transfer fails just abandons the purchase, and the merchant loses a sale without learning the cause. At such a small order value, one failed payment costs more than several successful ones earn. That is the context for what consumers here now expect: security, trust in the platform, their preferred payment method, real-time settlement, and reliable delivery. Across ASEAN, 60% of transactions are already digital and mobile penetration stands at 136%. Meeting the standard is the price of participating in the growth. DEFA and BSP's new pricing rules. Two regulatory movements are underway: The first is DEFA. Negotiations concluded in Manila on 29 May 2026, with signing scheduled for the 49th ASEAN Summit in November. It covers digital trade, cross-border data flows, electronic payments, digital identity, consumer protection, and cybersecurity. World Economic Forum analysis estimates the region's digital economy will reach $1 trillion by 2030, and up to $2 trillion with DEFA implemented. On the implementation panel moderated by the International Trade Centre's Rami Hourani, ASEAN-BAC representatives from the Philippines, Brunei, Laos, and Timor-Leste worked through what it takes to turn a signed agreement into something a business in Davao or Vientiane can use. The second is domestic and drove more debate. In June, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas issued Memorandum M-2026-025, implementing Circular 1238 and lifting the 2021 moratorium on InstaPay and PESONet pricing. With the rules taking effect on 4 July, small merchants can no longer be charged for receiving digital payments. Any gap between interbank and intrabank fees must reflect actual costs. Digital fees must sit below over-the-counter equivalents, and recipients must receive the full amount sent. An IMF technical report found that fragmented clearing infrastructure has kept Philippine retail transaction fees above regional peers. The merger of BancNet and the Philippine Clearing House Corporation into the Phillipines Payments Network removes much of the structural justification for that spread. Finance Secretary Frederick Go has argued fees should approach ₱2. Within weeks, most major banks, including BPI, BDO, Metrobank, Landbank, and Unionbank, removed interbank transfer fees entirely, while e-wallets and digital banks largely did not, retaining charges around ₱10 or capping free transfers at a monthly quota. The BSP's own fee disclosures document the split. Institutions with deposit spreads absorbed the change immediately. Institutions whose revenues depend on transaction revenue could not, and those are frequently the same institutions that provided the reach the policy is designed to extend. BSP survey data shows formal account ownership at 58% of adults, with e-money accounts at more than double the rate of bank accounts. Financial access here has been delivered through digital wallets rather than branches. The rails that produced the inclusion gains of the past five years are the ones most exposed to a pricing rule incumbent banks can absorb without difficulty. I believe both positions make valid points. Cost is a real barrier to inclusion, and Philippine fees have been high by regional standards. Innovation also has to be funded, and the providers who reached underserved segments did so on transaction economics. The question I would ask is whether a rule that widens access at the point of transfer preserves the capacity to keep extending access over the next five years. A fee schedule and a financial inclusion outcome are the same decision viewed at different distances. Read as a technical instrument, the memorandum adjusts pricing. If followed through, it shapes which providers can afford to serve the hardest-to-reach customers. Treating those as separate questions is how sound policy can still produce undesired outcomes. Payment interoperability is also a manufacturing, retail and logistics problem. The Futurecast panel series made an argument through its structure alone. Diverse groups of speakers from the region representing councils spanning manufacturing, retail, logistics, and agriculture. Payment interoperability took up a substantial part of their discussion. For an e-commerce operator, financial inclusion defines the accessible market. For an online travel agency, a traveller who cannot complete a booking because their wallet is unsupported is a lost opportunity. For a manufacturer selling across three ASEAN markets, cross-border settlement friction is a working capital challenge. Every consumer-facing business in the region depends on end-user trust in how people pay. As Lin-Manuel Miranda said, "I'm not throwing away my shot." Businesses outside financial services tend to file DEFA and the BSP rules under 'someone else's problem', and that is the shot being thrown away. My view is that the next 10 years will favour companies that can scale across multiple ASEAN markets, work with regulation rather than around it, localise, and earn trust. Beyond payment capabilities, these will be essential business requirements. They surface at the payment step because that is where strong compliance, local partnerships, and infrastructure choices determines whether a customer completes a purchase. The data-and-distribution shift. A parallel pattern runs across the region: Businesses are investing in direct customer relationships and the data that comes with them. Part of the calculation is margin. When distribution runs entirely through channels a business does not control, its unit economics are set by another party's take rate, and at a five-dollar average order value there is little room for error. A business that cannot observe how its customers pay is operating on inference and hearsay. It does not know which wallet they select, whether they abandon at the payment step, or how behaviour differs between Cebu and Kuala Lumpur. I would call that a gap in the customer relationship rather than the reporting. Understanding the end user's payment journey is understanding the customer. What this asks of the businesses in the room. Despite the openness of the Summit, a lot of the decisions setting terms for 680 million people in Southeast Asia are still made behind closed doors. What the Summit showed is that these doors can be opened, and that the businesses affected can be present for the debate rather than briefed on its conclusion. However, the system is still imperfect. The people whose access is being decided, the merchant taking ₱250 payments in a provincial market, the customer with a wallet and no bank account, are currently unconsulted. I would like to draw parallels to Hamilton's closing question: "Who lives, who dies, who tells your story." Southeast Asia's digital decade will be recounted at some point, and the conversation will be heavily focused on whether access widened in practice, or decisions were still made behind closed doors. That is being decided now, in fee schedules and framework agreements and the infrastructure choices businesses make this year. How Xendit can help. Access is a technical problem before it is anything else. Xendit builds payment infrastructure across Southeast Asia, including cross-border collections and payouts, for businesses expanding within the region. If you are working out what DEFA, the BSP's pricing rules, or the shift toward direct customer relationships mean for your business, talk to its team.

Xendit vs other payment gateways: which one fits your business. Choosing a payment gateway feels harder than it should when every provider claims the lowest fees and the widest reach. Founders in Indonesia, the Philippines, and the rest of Southeast Asia often pick a gateway based on a sales pitch, then discover local coverage gaps months later. This guide compares Xendit against Stripe, PayPal, Midtrans, PayMongo, and HitPay on fees, coverage, and features so you can match the right tool to your market. What sets Xendit apart. Xendit builds its infrastructure around Southeast Asia first. The platform connects directly to local banks and payment partners across Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Hong Kong, which speeds up settlement times compared to gateways that route local transactions through international networks. Xendit also covers more than 100 payment methods, including bank transfers, e-wallets, and card payments, plus disbursement tools that let marketplaces pay out to multiple sellers at once. Its fraud detection system relies on machine learning to catch suspicious activity while keeping false declines low, and the platform adds recurring billing for subscription businesses. Xendit vs Stripe. Stripe remains the strongest choice for companies that need global reach. It supports more than 135 currencies and a mature set of developer tools, which makes it a natural fit for SaaS companies selling worldwide. Stripe struggles, though, with local payment habits in Indonesia and the Philippines, since bank transfers and regional e-wallets are not its core strength. On pricing, the gap is measurable: in the Philippines, Xendit charges 2.9% plus fifteen pesos on card payments, while Stripe charges 3.4% plus fifteen pesos, with an extra 1% on international cards. Businesses that sell mainly within Southeast Asia typically save money and gain payment method coverage with Xendit, while businesses expanding into the United States or Europe still benefit from Stripe's global tooling. Xendit vs PayPal. PayPal carries enormous brand trust, with more than 392 million active accounts worldwide, and many international shoppers already have an account ready to use. That recognition matters for cross-border sales, but PayPal does not match Xendit on local Southeast Asian payment methods such as direct bank transfers and region-specific e-wallets. Businesses that sell mostly to local customers in Indonesia or the Philippines generally see higher checkout conversion with Xendit, while businesses that depend on international buyers benefit from keeping PayPal as a secondary option. Xendit vs regional competitors. Midtrans, PayMongo, and HitPay each compete with Xendit on their home turf. Midtrans often costs slightly less for small Indonesian merchants, charging around 2.9% plus Rp 2,000 on local cards compared to Xendit's 3% plus Rp 2,000, though the difference shrinks once transaction volume grows. PayMongo focuses only on the Philippines and appeals to developer-first teams, since Stripe and Y Combinator back the company. HitPay stands out in Singapore with PayNow fees starting at 0.65%, the lowest among major providers, and it pairs online payments with in-person point-of-sale hardware for retail and food businesses. HitPay's tradeoff is limited infrastructure for expanding across multiple Southeast Asian markets and no built-in support for complex marketplace payout splitting, both areas where Xendit performs strongly. Where Xendit wins and where it falls short. Xendit wins on regional depth. Few providers match its combination of local bank integrations, disbursement tools, recurring billing, and fraud controls across six or more Southeast Asian countries in a single API. That combination matters most for marketplaces, platforms that pay multiple sellers, and subscription businesses operating regionally. Xendit falls short once a business needs to sell heavily outside Southeast Asia and Latin America, since its network does not run as deep in the United States, Europe, or other global markets. Companies scaling globally often pair Xendit for regional collections with Stripe or PayPal for international sales. Which payment gateway should you Choose. The right choice depends on where your customers are and how your business collects revenue. * Choose Xendit if you sell primarily to customers in Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, or Hong Kong, or if you run a marketplace that needs to pay out to multiple sellers. * Choose Stripe if your customers are mostly in the United States or Europe and you need broad currency and payment method support. * Choose PayPal if international buyer trust and instant checkout recognition matter more than local payment method depth. * Choose Midtrans if you run a small Indonesian business focused only on card payments and want the lowest possible per-transaction rate. * Choose PayMongo if you operate only in the Philippines and want a developer-first integration. * Choose HitPay if you run a Singapore retail or food business that needs both online PayNow payments and in-person point-of-sale hardware. Frequently asked questions. Is Xendit cheaper than Stripe? In markets like the Philippines, Xendit charges lower card fees than Stripe, and it adds more local payment methods at no extra integration cost. Stripe can still work out cheaper for businesses that process mostly international cards outside Southeast Asia. Does Xendit work outside Southeast Asia? Xendit supports cross-border and global setups for businesses that need them, but its core strength stays within Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, and parts of Latin America. What is the best alternative to Xendit? PayPal Payments ranks as a commonly cited top alternative to Xendit on review platforms, followed by GoCardless and Stripe Connect, depending on whether a business needs global reach or automated recurring payments. Can I use Xendit and another gateway together? Yes. Many businesses run Xendit for Southeast Asian collections and pair it with Stripe or PayPal to cover the United States, Europe, or other markets outside Xendit's core region. The bottom line. No single payment gateway wins every category. Xendit earns its place for businesses built around Southeast Asia, thanks to local bank integrations, disbursement tools, and fraud controls that competitors struggle to match in the region. Stripe and PayPal still make sense for businesses chasing global reach, and smaller regional players like Midtrans, PayMongo, and HitPay fit specific niches where their focus beats a broader platform. Match the gateway to where your customers actually are, and the fees will matter far less than the payment methods your checkout page can actually offer. Julian Thorne is a distinguished Technical Strategist and Fintech Analyst with over 6 years of experience in digital payment architectures. Specializing in the integration of high-performance gateways like Xendit, she focuses on optimizing the intersection of gamification and online ticketing systems. Julian's expertise lies in deconstructing complex payment flows and enhancing sales effectiveness through data-driven insights. Her recent work deeply explores the evolution of digital event platforms in 2026, providing actionable strategies for global summits and large-scale ticketing infrastructures.