Event-native data platform innovator Kurrent has launched the open source KurrentDB MCP Server, which makes it possible for developers to use AI agents to interact with data inside KurrentDB without writing code. Users can now not only read and write events to the database but also create, test and debug projections or extend the available prompts to prototype applications using natural language. This is a capability exclusive to Kurrent that eliminates the traditional learning curve for database interactions. Kurrent MCP Server features self-correction when prototyping, allowing developers to test projection logic and help debug issues through conversational commands. Compatible with all frontier AI models and released under MIT license for community contribution and enterprise adoption without licensing restriction, Kurrent’s MCP Server makes development tasks that previously required hours of coding and corrections achievable in minutes. “Our new MCP Server makes it possible to use the main features of the KurrentDB database, like reading and writing events to streams and using projections, in a way that’s as simple as having a conversation,” said Kirk Dunn, CEO at Kurrent. “The system’s ability to test and fix itself reduces the need for debugging and increases reliability. Copilots and AI assistants become productive database partners rather than just code generators, seamlessly interfacing with KurrentDB.” The Kurrent MCP Server is compatible with every frontier model including Claude, GPT-4 and Gemini, and can be used with Cursor, Windsurf and other MCP-supported IDEs, clients and agent frameworks. It offers eight core capabilities that respond to natural language prompts, eliminating traditional database interaction friction points. These features make visual and analytical exploration conversational and intuitive. Kurrent MCP Server’s unique self-correction capability also sets it apart, making prototyping projections much easier and faster.
Peer, an AI-native platform reinvents the internet as a persistent, explorable universe, where users show up as avatars, connected by location, and building relationships in a living, spatial network
Peer, the AI-native platform reinventing the internet as a persistent, explorable universe, launched its Global Simulation—a real-time digital Earth where users show up as avatars, connect by location, and build relationships in a living, spatial network. Peer is designed as a native environment for agentic AI—an operating system where AI can move, perceive, and act within a shared world. By giving AI form and placing it in a common, persistent, and spatial environment, Peer creates a natural interface for human-AI interaction. It can be a Web3 or Web2 experience, said Tony Tran, CEO of Peer. Every user is paired with their own AI agent—an intelligent companion that learns, evolves, and operates alongside them. This makes AI feel personal, useful, and embodied—an essential step toward making AI adoption universal and seamlessly woven into daily life. At the core of Peer is a dynamic 3D map of the world—a new substrate where digital experiences are anchored to real places. This isn’t a game world or escapist simulation—it’s a living layer that blends the physical and digital into one continuous environment. Users appear as avatars tied to real-world and virtual locations, with full control over their visibility and presence. Powered by GPS and VPS (Virtual Positioning System), Peer transforms the map into an interactive space where people can explore, drop content, discover others, and build communities. Unlike traditional apps or games, this is a digital reality that starts from the real world—making it feel authentic, grounded, and alive. By combining a simulation of Earth with generative AI, avatars, and real-time spatial interaction, Peer creates a new operating system for human-AI coexistence. Peer is currently rolling out its first phase and will expand into AI agents, immersive worldbuilding, and custom hardware.
BaaS Griffin is creating an agentic bank enabling an MCP server to have agents that can open accounts, make payments, and analyze historic events
Banking-as-a-Service bank Griffin is opening up access to a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server, providing a way for AI agents to autonomously perform tasks on behalf of customers. Griffin, which secured a full banking licence in March last year, says the initiative is the beginning of massive technological platform shift, which will see people delegating more and more of their work to AI. “We think there is much further to go…but to get there, the financial system has to be fundamentally rewired to accommodate a world in which agents can freely transact — while still retaining appropriate safeguards.” Potential use cases cited include end-to-end wealth management, payment admin and transactional capabilities. “This is early for us – we’re in beta – but it shows the power of what’s possible,” says the bank. “You can use the Griffin MCP server to have an agent open accounts, make payments, and analyse historic events. You can also use it to build complete prototypes of your own fintech applications on top of the Griffin API – which we’re already seeing customers doing in real time.”
Fintech Chime is said to plan IPO launch as soon as Monday weighing a valuation of about $11 billion
Chime Financial Inc. is planning to launch its initial public offering as soon as Monday, as US listings bounce back from a disappointing April. The no-fee banking services company is weighing a valuation of about $11 billion. Chime was valued at $25 billion after raising $750 million in a funding round in 2021, according to an announcement at the time. The firm which filed for a listing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission in May, is set to disclose how much it will seek to raise in the IPO. No final decisions have been made and details of the offering including valuation and timing could change. Chime disclosed net income of $12.9 million on revenue of $518.7 million for the first three months of 2025, according to its latest filing. That compares with net income of $15.9 million on revenue of $392 million a year earlier. Chime’s largest investors include affiliates of DST Global, Crosslink Capital, Len Blavatnik’s Access Industries, General Atlantic, Menlo Ventures, Sino French (Innovation) Fund and Iconiq Strategic Partners, the filing shows. The offering is being led by Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. The company plans for its shares to trade on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol CHYM.
Stripe co-founder says banks are ‘very interested’ in how to integrate stablecoins into their product offerings
Payments firm Stripe has reportedly held initial talks with banks about using stablecoins. These discussions are happening as Stripe is rolling out a series of stablecoin-related products. “In the conversations we have with them, they’re very interested,” Stripe President and Co-Founder John Collison said. “This is not something that banks are just kind of brushing away or treating as a fad. Banks are very interested in how they should be integrated with stablecoins into their product offerings as well.” Stripe is among several companies in the FinTech space — including PayPal, FIS, and Fiserv — that are using stablecoins as a method of payment, and not just something used in crypto trading. “Regulated bank-issued stablecoins offer faster, more efficient and globally accessible payment options,” said Julia Demidova, head of digital currencies product and strategy at FIS. “With proper regulation, banks will become central players in digital assets, driving innovation while ensuring consumer protection.”
Visa’s tokenization for agentic AI payments involves three components: upgrading cards to handle agents; enabling agent transactions; and personalization to make LLM queries more relevant
Visa is experimenting with agentic artificial intelligence that would add automated execution for consumers to queries on large-language models. Executives wouldn’t put a timetable on when these products will go live, but they are being tested in internal sandboxes. Jack Forestell, San Francisco-based chief product and strategy officer, explained how the first iterations of agentic AI will work. “We formed a point of view that AI and specifically agent-driven AI has the potential to radically transform the way we discover, the way we shop and the way we buy,” he said. Forestell’s teams have thought through all of these things. This doesn’t mean the service is flawless – it’s experimental – but it’s ready to go live. Stephen Karpin, Singapore-based president of Visa’s Asia-Pacific business, says this is the latest iteration of a move by the company from organizing itself around products, toward services. “This involves a combination of our infrastructure, capabilities, and APIs to create a ‘Visa as a Service’ stack,” he said, noting this is only possible because the company has spent decades building the foundations of its payments-processing network. “We are shifting to a services architecture that includes risk management, settlement, credential directors, and now tokenization,” he said. “This is now all scaling.” Visa reckons there will be massive demand for agentic AI. Forestell noted OpenAI and the like have quickly amassed more than 1 billion active users. Traffic volume from LLM sites to retail and marketplace websites is rising fast. What’s missing is the ability to pay directly off the back of a query. LLMs don’t have access to credit-card numbers or passwords. And there’s no trust factor: consumers fear agents would misrepresent them or steal their money; banks can’t tell if an agent is legitimate; merchants aren’t confident they’ll be paid. Forestell says Intelligent Commerce has been engineered for people to buy with AI and be confident the payment is as safe and secure as it is with a credit card.
. It’s really about tokenization. This involves three components: upgrading cards to handle agents; enabling agent transactions; and personalization to make LLM queries more relevant. This AI-prep work is focused on tokenization, which payments companies have applied to other digital payments for a decade or so. This involves replacing the 16-digit number on a plastic card with a unique, cryptographically protected code, like a one-time pass that is linked to an account but if hacked doesn’t provide access to funds or instructions. This abstraction layer is being refitted for agentic AI, meaning these tokens can interact with agents. This capability is augmented by services that sync payment instructions, and signals that ensure all authorized parties in a transaction have the same access to data for processing, detecting fraud, and handling disputes.
Apollo Global is reportedly working with JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and three other banks to trade private credit and be able to originate larger loans and continue helping individual clients who need to redeem
Apollo Global Management is reportedly working with five banks, including JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group, to trade private credit. The collaboration will enable Apollo and its partners to syndicate investment grade debt on a larger scale, with the banks acting as broker-dealers. With the extra liquidity, Apollo will be able to originate larger loans and continue helping individual clients who need to redeem their investments more often than institutions. The collaboration came as Apollo has been working to build a marketplace for private credit deals and to increase the number of buyers on the secondary market. Banks have also planned to build trading desks for this market. The private credit market has been booming as it offers a capital “lifeline” of sorts to a variety of borrowers, especially smaller firms that have been, or still are, underserved as they seek capital from traditional markets. Private lending may also be extended to firms that are backed by private equity vehicles.
Zown, a real estate platform , is expanding into California giving buyers an upfront “down payment boost” by redirecting a portion of the buyer’s agent commission — up to 2% of the purchase price — to the buyer
Zown, a real estate platform that offers upfront financial help to homebuyers, is expanding into California with a goal to ease the burden of down payments and elevated home prices. The service has launched in the Golden State after gaining traction in Canada, where it supported more than 250 homebuyers and facilitated $300 million-plus in transactions. The platform gives buyers an upfront “down payment boost” by redirecting a portion of the buyer’s agent commission — up to 2% of the purchase price — to the buyer. Rishard Rameez, Zown’s co-founder and CEO. “Most middle-income earners are stuck paying someone else’s mortgage via monthly rent. At the same time, they earn too much to qualify for traditional assistance programs, but not enough to save for a down payment as home prices climb. That’s where Zown steps in. We’re setting a new standard for the industry by providing upfront, tangible support where buyers need it most, at the start of their journey.” Rameez added that his own frustrations as a home seller led to the creation of Zown. Zown pairs buyers with a licensed agent who uses the company’s tools — such as artificial intelligence-powered pricing insights, real-time comparable data and predictive analytics — to help navigate the market. Preapprovals are processed quickly, sometimes in under five minutes, either through a buyer’s preferred lender or Zown’s system, leaders said. A statewide network of listing agents also allows buyers to schedule home tours on demand, avoiding the bottlenecks often associated with the traditional single-agent model. Zown said it retains just 1% of the buyer’s agent commission and returns the remainder to the buyer as an upfront down payment boost — or to buy down mortgage rates and lower monthly payments. Agents are paid a salary rather than working solely on commission — a change that’s designed to encourage service over sales volume, Zown said. “Buying a home is one of life’s biggest milestones, and you deserve an agent who sees you as more than just a transaction,” said Lisa Touney, Zown’s lead real estate agent for California. “Zown’s technology was built to ensure fast, reliable, and human support every step of the way, so while Zown buyers of course praise the savings, just as regarded is the service they receive and the support they feel throughout the process.” Zown agents also have access to proprietary tools that include consolidated data on factors such as commute times, school ratings and crime statistics — features the company said give agents deeper insights to guide clients through buying or selling.
BCG’s Global Fintech Report says future growth is likely to come from fintechs in three emerging segments B2B(2X), Financial Infrastructure, and Lending
BCG’s Global Fintech Report says 2024 marked a turning point. Funding and valuations stabilized, and fundamentals improved sharply. Fintech revenues grew 21% year-over-year, up from 13% in 2023, and outpaced the 6% growth in the broader financial services sector. EBITDA margins for public fintechs increased by 25%, and 69% of them achieved profitability—up from less than half the year before. The first chapter of fintech produced scaled winners in digital wallets, acquiring, vertical SaaS, challenger banking, crypto trading, and BNPL. While a few players may still scale in these areas, these winners will be increasingly hard to displace. Future growth is likely to come from fintechs in three emerging segments:
B2B(2X). Businesses still face many pain points in payments, accounting, and treasury management—areas where AI can automate. Fintechs also still have much room for growth in embedding their solutions in SaaS platforms.
Financial Infrastructure. Though slower to scale due to longer sales and implementation cycles, the world’s financial infrastructure requires modernization to take advantage of technologies like AI and onchain finance.
Lending. Lending remains underpenetrated and ripe for innovation beyond unsecured consumer credit, especially in business and secured lending. As noted, new tailwinds are emerging that will support growth in this area.
Model Context Protocol: MCP should pivot towards an independent governance model and a formal consortium, away from its single vendor status for it to become a true open industry standard
Anthropic’s Model Context Protocol (MCP) proposes a clean, stateless protocol for how large language models (LLMs) can discover and invoke external tools with consistent interfaces and minimal developer friction. This has the potential to transform isolated AI capabilities into composable, enterprise-ready workflows. In turn, it could make integrations standardized and simpler. MCP is not yet a formal industry standard. Despite its open nature and rising adoption, it is still maintained and guided by a single vendor, primarily designed around the Claude model family. A true standard requires more than just open access. There should be an independent governance group, representation from multiple stakeholders and a formal consortium to oversee its evolution, versioning and any dispute resolution. None of these elements are in place for MCP today. While MCP presents a promising direction, mission-critical systems demand predictability, stability and interoperability, which are best delivered by mature, community-driven standards. Protocols governed by a neutral body ensure long-term investment protection, safeguarding adopters from unilateral changes or strategic pivots by any single vendor. The idea behind MCP is that models should speak a consistent language to tools. Prima facie: This is not just a good idea, but a necessary one. It is a foundational layer for how future AI systems will coordinate, execute and reason in real-world workflows. The road to widespread adoption is neither guaranteed nor without risk.