Asian Legal Review

Thai lender KASIKORNBANK (KBank) has entered a strategic collaboration with Ant International to develop blockchain-based infrastructure for real-time, 24/7 cross-border USD transactions, combining KBank’s regulated banking capabilities with AI tools from Ant Group’s cross-border payments arm.

The partnership will leverage Kinexys’ Blockchain Deposit Accounts, a distributed ledger platform by J.P. Morgan, to enable real-time USD liquidity movement. This is expected to improve transaction speeds and address liquidity bottlenecks in the regional cross-border payments market that currently forces SMEs to navigate fragmented clearing and settlement systems.

Under the agreement, the two parties plan to develop end-to-end solutions covering payment acceptance, clearing, and settlement across Southeast Asia, subject to regulatory approvals. The move builds on an existing relationship: KBank’s KPLUS mobile app is already integrated with Alipay+, Ant’s digital wallet gateway, linking to over 1.8 billion consumer accounts globally. KPLUS also serves as a payment option on Google Pay for Thai merchants via Antom.

Dr. Karin Boonlertvanich, Executive Vice President at KBank, said: “This collaboration addresses a fundamental limitation in today’s cross-border financial systems, where liquidity movement remains constrained by fragmented infrastructure.”

Ant International’s Kelvin Li added: “Across emerging markets, industry leaders like KBank are preparing communities for a more interconnected global economy with broader and more secure application of AI and blockchain technology.”

The deal occurs against a backdrop of expanding ASEAN cross-border payment initiatives, including the ASEAN Cross-Border Payment Linkage initiative and individual national CBDC pilots. Thailand’s Bank of Thailand has been exploring digital baht infrastructure since 2022, while Singapore’s Monetary Authority has advanced Project Orchid with the Bank of Japan for cross-border digital currency settlements.

For Asian legal readers, the KBank-Ant arrangement raises questions about regulatory oversight of blockchain-based banking services across borders, particularly as banks increasingly partner with offshore tech platforms to bypass legacy correspondent banking constraints.

Source: FinTech Singapore — Original article

The United States, United Kingdom, and Australia have announced a new underwater drone technology development project under their military AUKUS alliance, marking the first major signature project under the pact’s Pillar Two of advanced capabilities.

Speaking at the Shangri-La Dialogue security summit in Singapore on May 30, 2026, the defence ministers of all three nations confirmed uncrewed undersea vehicle (UUV) technology expected to be operational by next year. UK Defence Secretary John Healey said Britain would contribute £150 million to the programme.

The announcement was a direct response to mounting criticism that AUKUS—the trilateral defence pact launched in 2021—had been too slow to deliver. “For too long in AUKUS, we talked too much and delivered too little,” Healey said. “That has now changed.”

The UUVs would carry cutting-edge payloads and enabling systems capable of protecting seabed infrastructure such as undersea communication cables and energy pipelines, conducting strikes, and carrying out surveillance and reconnaissance operations across the Indo-Pacific region.

Healey also confirmed that sensors and weapons systems would be developed for the drones, which he said would ‘rapidly give our forces advanced battle technologies,’ including capability to counter threats to underwater cables and pipelines. He noted the programme would strengthen deterrence in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Arctic waters.

The project comes against a backdrop of increasing concern over undersea infrastructure vulnerabilities. British officials report a 30% rise in Russian vessels spotted in UK waters over the past years, and there have been multiple reports of undersea cables damaged in the Baltic Sea and in waters surrounding Taiwan.

Alongside the drone announcement, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth reaffirmed the United States’ commitment to its Asia-Pacific allies while pushing them to increase defence spending. He set a target of 3.5% of GDP for allied military budgets, praising South Korea, Japan, Australia, and the Philippines for recent defence cooperation with Washington, while calling New Zealand a ‘freeloader.’

The AUKUS partnership remains widely viewed as a strategy to counter China’s growing maritime presence in the Indo-Pacific. China has declined to send its defence minister to the Shangri-La Dialogue for the second consecutive year, while Japan’s Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi strongly rebuffed Beijing’s repeated accusations of ‘new militarism’ during his speech at the summit earlier the same day.

A blast on Sunday at a building in northeastern Myanmar said to have been storing explosives for mining has killed more than 45 people, according to rescuers and independent media reports.
About 70 other people were injured in the explosion that took place around noon in the village of Kaungtup, in Namhkam township.
The area, located about 3 kilometres (2 miles) south of the Chinese border, is under the control of the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, an ethnic armed group which has engaged in…

Members of Asean might have conflicting claims in the South China Sea but mutual trust existed in the bloc, Philippine defence chief Gilberto Teodoro Jnr said on Sunday, singling out Beijing as the biggest obstacle to a code of conduct in the disputed waterway.
Teodoro delivered strong words for China in the final panel of the Shangri-La Dialogue security forum in Singapore, taking aim at Manila’s long-time maritime rival for disregarding an international arbitral tribunal, which ruled in favour…

In what represents a significant shift in U.S. corporate tax policy, the Trump administration has cleared the way for American companies to avoid paying taxes in U.S. tax havens while instead routing profits through offshore jurisdictions including Malta and Cyprus.

According to a report by the New York Times published on May 29, 2026, the policy change effectively allows U.S. corporations to structure their operations so that taxable income is redirected away from the United States and toward countries that serve as traditional tax havens. This marks a notable reversal in intent regarding offshore tax avoidance, which has been a campaign issue in recent years.

The decision carries particular significance for Southeast Asia, where several jurisdictions serve as important offshore financial centers. Malaysia, in particular, has positioned itself as a leading financial hub in the ASEAN region, with well-developed Islamic finance, wealth management, and fund administration capabilities. The country has actively courted international financial institutions and family offices in recent years as part of its broader economic strategy.

While Malta and Cyprus are explicitly named in the NYT report, the broader implications extend across multiple Southeast Asian financial centers. The region has seen growing demand for private banking and fund administration services, with firms in Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines expanding operations to capture cross-border wealth management flows. Any policy shift that encourages corporate tax avoidance through offshore structures could amplify these trends.

The move is expected to face scrutiny from international tax bodies and may draw further regulatory responses from other governments. The OECD’s global minimum tax framework, which aims to prevent a “race to the bottom” in corporate taxation, could face additional pressure as more U.S. companies exploit these new pathways.

For ASEAN regulators and financial compliance officers, the development signals a more permissive U.S. stance on offshore tax structures — a policy environment that could influence how regional financial centers position themselves in the global tax architecture. The timing is critical: with crypto regulation, cross-border payment frameworks, and anti-money laundering standards evolving rapidly across Southeast Asia, the region’s financial hubs will need to navigate a complex and shifting international compliance landscape.

The story underscores how U.S. tax policy decisions continue to reverberate through Southeast Asian financial markets and regulatory frameworks — even when the immediate geographic focus is on European tax havens.

Read the full story: “Trump Clears Way for Companies to Avoid Taxes in Havens Including Malta and Cyprus” — The New York Times

The world can learn diplomatic lessons from Asean, East Timor President Jose Ramos-Horta has said in a strongly worded rebuke to existing global power structures.
At the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore on Saturday, Ramos-Horta, who leads the newest and 11th member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, argued that the bloc epitomised how dialogue could prevent conflict and yield dividends.
He acknowledged that Asean was “not heaven on earth”, achieving consensus was “frustratingly slow”…

Five villagers trapped deep in a flooded cave in Laos have been freed, ending a 10-day underground ordeal that relied on expert cave rescuers racing against time to guide the group through flooded passages before fresh rains further complicated the mission.
Hugs, cheers and tears met four of the group who emerged thin and muddied on Saturday afternoon to be quickly wrapped in foil blankets to regulate their body temperature after days in the damp, cold cave.
Another man was freed overnight.
But…

Investors looking to back geothermal projects across the Asia Pacific region must carefully plan in advance for regulatory risks if they wish to unlock its full potential, according to experts.