The Payments Canada SUMMIT 2025, held May 6–8 in Toronto, convened over 2,000 payment industry delegates and roughly 280 speakers under the banner Innovate. Collaborate. Transform. The theme underscored an urgent call for industry-wide cooperation to shape Canada’s payment future. Payments Canada President and CEO Susan Hawkins opened the conference by celebrating that shared purpose. In her remarks she told attendees that the future of Canadian payments “is not preordained but created through our shared efforts” – in other words, the industry must unite around “shaping a stronger, brighter future” for payments in Canada.
Interac President & CEO Jeremy Wilmot followed with a keynote urging rapid modernization. He warned that “slow progress on improving digital payment infrastructure is partially responsible for Canada’s lagging GDP”. and he called for greater “alignment” among regulators, banks and fintechs to speed things up. His message aligned with Hawkins’s theme of collaboration in the face of economic headwinds.
Later that first day, Payments Canada’s Chief Delivery Officer Jude Pinto delivered a detailed update on the Real-Time Rail (RTR) project. Joined on stage by the RTR delivery partners, Pinto confirmed that the technical build is now roughly 60% complete and still on schedule to finish by Q3 2025. The RTR is envisioned as a “made-for-Canada” instant-payment network that will clear and settle interbank payments 24/7/365. Notably, industry reports emphasize that Payments Canada and Interac are co-leading the initiative – in fact, one briefing described the RTR as “a system … that Payments Canada oversees and Interac is building”. Pinto stressed that the system’s fraud-prevention capabilities will be robust from day one: a new centralized fraud scoring service, risk monitoring platform, and real-time confirmation-of-payee checks are being built into RTR to enhance security. In sum, the RTR update underscored that Canada’s faster-payments rails are on track and being built through broad industry collaboration.
Alongside the keynotes, Summit sessions and panels addressed core themes in payments. Over the first two days, delegates heard discussions on fraud prevention and mitigation, payment modernization, regulatory policy, data infrastructure, customer experience and emerging technologies. For example, one panel titled “Real-time Rails, Real-time Risks” examined how AI and analytics can help detect and prevent instant-payment fraud. Another session on regulatory policy tackled questions of how rules and governance must evolve to accommodate real-time clearing. Many speakers noted the growing importance of data-driven infrastructure – as Payments Canada’s agenda highlighted, the industry is focused on “Data-Powered Payments” and better leveraging transaction data for risk management and customer insights. In interviews and smaller breakouts, industry leaders also shared solutions for improving transaction transparency and speed, from real-time payee validation to enhanced cross-border interoperability.
A new element of The SUMMIT this year was the introduction of six intensive Deep Dive workshops on Day 3. These half-day, expert-led sessions allowed participants to roll up their sleeves on specific topics in a hands-on format. Deep Dive tracks included AI and Payments, Cross-Border Payments, Customer Experience, Fraud Prevention & Mitigation, Policy, Rules & Regulation, and Real-Time Payments. In these sessions, speakers led in-depth case studies and Ask-Me-Anything discussions. For instance, the AI & Payments workshop (in partnership with RedCompass Labs) examined how machine learning can optimize fraud detection and personalize the payment experience. Another deep dive focused on payment governance, exploring new legal frameworks and regulatory strategies to support the Real-Time Rail launch. Attendees reported that these curated sessions offered valuable practical insights and networking – a complement to the summit’s main-stage program of keynotes and panels.
The Summit was also a showcase for industry announcements and product launches. Toronto fintech Dream Payments announced it will add Interac e-Transfer into its embedded DreamPay platform for payouts. With this feature, insurers, financial institutions and other clients can instantly deliver funds using only an email address or phone number. Dream executives emphasized that embedding e-Transfer delivers the “speed, security and simplicity” that partners and payees demand. Similarly, Shakepay – a cryptocurrency-focused payment platform – announced it has become a member of Payments Canada and plans to pursue direct access to Canada’s core payment rails. Shakepay CEO Jean Amiouny called membership “a pivotal moment” toward redefining how Canadians move money, enabling the startup to build more efficient, faster payment products in the coming years.
Other companies took the opportunity to unveil new payment solutions. Dye & Durham introduced an automated error-correction tool for its CANACT BillPay service. This first-of-its-kind feature digitizes the process of returning and tracing failed bill payments. By automating error resolution, it shrinks correction times from weeks to days and improves transparency for banks, billers and end customers. As Dye & Durham’s CEO noted, the tool is “a major step forward in modernizing Canada’s bill payment infrastructure”. Berkeley Payment Solutions of Toronto announced that it has completed a migration of its card-processing infrastructure to a new platform from Episode Six. According to the firms, this partnership enabled Berkeley to carry out a large-scale migration in under five months – a record pace that “sets a new standard for speed and scale” in modern card processing. Berkeley’s CEO Lawrence Tepperman said the flexible new platform will let the company scale into new markets and launch products more quickly. Lastly, Paramount Commerce announced a strategic integration with BMO Bank. Paramount will leverage BMO’s banking APIs to process pay-by-bank transactions on behalf of its merchants. By tapping into BMO’s infrastructure, Paramount plans to streamline operations, enhance real-time reporting and lower costs, delivering “a faster, more secure” payment experience for merchants and consumers. Both Paramount’s COO and BMO executives emphasized that the collaboration delivers smarter payment flows built to scale with industry demand.
By closing time on May 8, the media noted, the Summit had generated a clear sense of momentum for Canada’s payments transformation. Delegates left with detailed technical roadmaps and new product announcements on the table. The final Deep Dive and panel sessions reiterated that the next phase of Canada’s payment evolution – from launch of the RTR to enhancing fraud defenses – will require both cutting-edge technology and broad cooperation. In a market where payments move almost $100 trillion annually, the Summit’s message was that innovation must be a team sport. As one delegate summed up, 2025’s conference made it clear that only by innovating together and transforming our shared infrastructure can Canada’s payments system rise to meet future challenges.
