When Sibos first convened in 1978, the financial world bore little resemblance to today’s interconnected digital ecosystem. Margaret Thatcher hadn’t yet assumed office, the Berlin Wall still divided Europe, and China remained largely closed to Western markets. 

In finance, electronic trading was in its infancy, the first ATMs were barely a decade old, and international wire transfers required days rather than seconds. SWIFT itself had only launched two years earlier with a modest network of 239 banks across 15 countries: a far cry from today’s 11,000+ member institutions spanning the globe.

Where 1978 saw telex machines and paper-based processes dominating cross-border transactions, we now navigate a landscape of real-time payments, blockchain protocols, and algorithmic trading that processes trillions of dollars in microseconds. 

The IBM System/370 mainframes that powered the financial institutions of that era possessed less computing power than today’s smartphones. Most remarkably, the entire concept of digital identity, cybersecurity frameworks, and data privacy regulations – now fundamental pillars of modern finance – simply didn’t exist.

This transformation brings us to Frankfurt and Sibos 2025, where we gather under the banner “The Next Frontiers of Global Finance.” The theme has led us to consider what the word ‘frontier’ actually means in this context.

A frontier, by definition, represents the boundary between the known and unknown, the established and the emerging. In finance, these boundaries are constantly shifting and being pushed forward. Rather, the critical question for Sibos will be what forces are propelling us into new territory, or even whether the difference will be stark enough to constitute a ‘new frontier’.

To decode this complex landscape, we’ve chosen to examine the current state of trade, trade finance, treasury, and payments through the strategic framework of a game: after all, global finance requires players to think simultaneously across regions and time horizons while adapting to ever-changing rules and opponents.

First, we consider the geopolitical “long game” – those macro-level policy shifts and international relationships that will fundamentally alter the trajectory of global finance over months, years, and decades. The current reconfiguration of trade relationships, the emergence of central bank digital currencies, and the ongoing debate over financial sovereignty versus interoperability all represent moves in this extended match. 

At the same time, some players – like SMEs, developing countries, and regions most affected by climate change – are playing on a different board altogether, struggling to get basic access to financing or even sanitation. It’s as essential to bring the most vulnerable on board as it is to explore new frontiers, and the industry is stepping up to the challenge. 

Simultaneously, financial institutions are implementing “defensive moves”, recognising that unprecedented times demand unprecedented preparation. The traditional risk management frameworks that served the industry well for decades crumble when confronted with cyber threats, climate-related financial risks, and the cascading effects of supply chain disruptions that can ripple across continents in hours.

These defensive strategies extend beyond conventional risk mitigation to encompass operational resilience, regulatory compliance across multiple jurisdictions, and the challenge of maintaining customer trust while embracing innovation. 

Finally, we examine how artificial intelligence (AI) is writing the “future playbook” for this new frontier. Unlike previous technological revolutions that primarily enhanced existing processes, today’s innovations are fundamentally reimagining the nature of financial services themselves. 

Machine learning algorithms now detect fraud patterns too subtle for human recognition, blockchain networks enable trustless transactions between previously incompatible systems, and quantum computing threatens to render current encryption methods obsolete while simultaneously offering new security paradigms.

Perhaps most significantly, these technologies are democratising access to sophisticated financial tools, enabling smaller institutions to compete with established giants and creating new categories of financial service providers that didn’t exist even five years ago.

As we embark on this exploration of finance’s next frontiers, we invite you to consider not just where these forces might lead us, but how your institution, your clients, and your career might evolve alongside them. The frontier ahead promises to be as transformative as the journey from 1978’s telex-driven world to today’s digital-first reality.

The game is already underway. The question is: are you playing to win?