By Doriss Chow
For decades, the banking industry has been defined by its boundaries. Long-standing constraints such as rigid legacy technology, traditional organizational structures, and limited human capacity set the ceiling for what banks could achieve and how fast they could evolve. But as we look toward 2026, these boundaries are not just thinning; they are dissolving.
We are entering the era of unconstrained banking. This represents a decisive moment for the industry to move beyond incremental adjustments and reimagine the very fabric of how work is being done, how trust is built, and how value is created. In the local context, this shift is powered by a maturing digital ecosystem where 71% of banking institutions have already implemented AI applications as of 2024, according to the BNM AI Survey.
This evolution aligns with the National AI Roadmap 2021–2025, which targets a vision where AI could inject approximately USD 113.4 billion into the national economy by 2030. With internet coverage in populated areas reaching 99.71% and AI beiang used by 67% of Malaysian adults in early 2026, the country is uniquely positioned to lead the regional unconstrained banking landscape.
The Rise of Programmable and Agentic Money
The nature of money itself is becoming smarter. We are moving from a world of manual transactions to one of programmable money, where payments execute automatically based on predefined conditions, such as an invoice verification or a cargo scan.
We are also moving toward a new phase of agentic money, where the focus shifts from manual oversight to delegation. Imagine a corporate treasury function where AI predicts cash flow needs and executes settlements autonomously, or a retail experience where an AI assistant identifies the best deposit rates and moves idle cash to maximise yield.
This isn’t a distant future. Early implementations of AI shopping agents and new partnerships between payment leaders and AI platforms are already signalling a shift toward autonomous, context-aware transactions. For traditional institutions, the risk is real. If digital currencies and alternative rails continue to gain traction, up to $13 trillion in transaction value could shift away from traditional methods by 2030.
Experience Everywhere: From Mobile to Ambient
Customer expectations are shifting toward fluid, conversational interfaces. In Malaysia, the first stop for orchestration will undoubtedly be the smartphone, but the future of experience follows customers beyond apps to wearables and external AI platforms.
Banks are beginning to design experiences from the outside-in, centred on customer intent. While 86% of consumers trust their main bank to deliver smart AI assistants, they still crave human connection for complex life moments.
We see this balance in action with a leading regional bank, which recently refreshed its wealth centres to provide high-touch, biometrics-secured spaces for guidance-heavy decisions. Similarly, a prominent digital-only bank has experimented with smart booths at major festivals to provide seamless banking touchpoints like fee-free cash withdrawals and card dispensing at lifestyle events.
The “10x Bank”: Capacity Without Constraints
We are witnessing a fundamental shift in workforce capacity. Traditionally, a bank’s capacity is tied to its headcount, a constraint that agentic AI is beginning to eliminate, allowing for growth that isn’t dependent on hiring. The vision of the “10x bank” is one where a single employee manages a team of specialised AI agents, exponentially expanding their impact.
One major global institution now utilises an AI assistant to manage over three billion client interactions, while its internal AI tools support nearly 90% of its workforce, freeing thousands of hours for higher-value work. Success in this transition requires a people-first approach. Leading organizations are already unifying AI experimentation into platforms that serve their entire workforce, combining strict governance with massive talent investment.
Turning Tech Debt into Digital Capital
For years, banks have layered new digital skins over brittle legacy cores. This high cost of low cost has left many spending 70% of their IT budgets just on maintenance.
Today, generative AI and open-source collaboration are making core modernization faster and more affordable. By adopting composable architectures, banks can share non-differentiating code while focusing their investments on the 30% of the stack that creates a competitive edge. One global banking group, for example, uses modern container platforms to manage critical workloads across multiple geographies, enabling rapid innovation and service continuity.
The Path Forward for Malaysia
The battle for the balance sheet is intensifying. With USD $200 trillion in global deposits and loans under siege from fintechs and private credit, banks cannot afford a wait-and-see approach.
To thrive in the unconstrained future, leaders must:
- Define a Digital Currency Strategy: Banks can play one or more roles in this arena, as issuers, custodians, facilitators or a combination of the three. They can collaborate with central banks, fintechs, and international partners to shape standards, share costs, and join active pilots or consortia.
- Modernize the Core: Move beyond brittle legacy systems to AI-ready architectures that integrate blockchain, distributed ledgers and stronger cybersecurity. Institutions can leverage the BNM Regulatory Sandbox “Green Lane” to accelerate the deployment of innovative solutions. This accelerated track, launched in early 2024, allows institutions with strong risk management records to bypass traditional barriers, shortening the path to live testing to as little as 15 days.
- Orchestrate Risk: Move from siloed controls to a big picture view that connects financial, cyber, and geopolitical threats. To achieve this, leaders must equip risk professionals with cross-functional capabilities and build multidisciplinary teams that combine risk, data, technology, and geopolitical expertise to strengthen strategic and agile decision-making.
The constraints of the past are disappearing. The banks that will lead in 2026 are those that embrace this new age of possibility, positioning themselves for a future that is faster, smarter, and more deeply human.
The author is the Managing Director, Financial Services, Malaysia at Accenture
