August 3, 2021, Washington, DC – Today, the Financial Data and Technology Association (FDATA) of North America submitted comments to Canada’s Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) as part of its pre-budget consultations in advance of the 2022 budget.
In its comments, FDATA North America called on the government to fully embrace a digital-first future for its financial sector as well as a consumer-centric model for its privacy arena, and pointed to a customer-directed finance (CDF) environment as a cornerstone of this future system. This new legal framework will “improve access to financial services, ensure a more level regulatory system for financial service providers, improve competitiveness, and foster innovation, all of which will contribute to health and sustained macroeconomic growth.”
To achieve a modernized open finance system that mitigates risks and protects consumers and small businesses by ensuring that providers’ privacy protections meet regulatory standards, that customer privacy is assured regardless of whether their chosen service provider is a financial institution or non-bank fintech, and recourse mechanisms to make consumers affected by a data breach whole, FDATA North America suggests that the government should include language in Budget 2022:
- implementing a CDF regime that include clear definitions of consumer and small business financial data rights, scope, and portability; and
- to enshrine a new CDF Implementation Entity (IE) tasked with the design and implementation of open finance in Canada.
Without this framework, Canada will remain in a financial status quo where consumers and other end users lack control of their personal information and cannot benefit from financial innovation. By delaying this approach, FDATA North America argues that Canada risks falling further behind as a world leader in digital innovation and misses an opportunity to provide cutting-edge financial services to its consumers and small businesses.
ABOUT FDATA NORTH AMERICA
FDATA was heavily involved in the UK Open Banking Working Group in 2015. In 2016, the working group’s output was published by Her Majesty’s Treasury as the Open Banking Standard. FDATA North America was founded in early 2018. Its members collectively provide tens of millions of consumers in Canada, the United States, and Mexico with aggregation-based tools to better manage their finances.
Members include air (Alliance for Innovative Regulation), APImetrics, Basis Theory, Betterment, BillGo, Codat, Direct ID, Envestnet Yodlee, Equitable Bank, Experian, Fiserv, Flinks, Interac, Intuit, Inverite, Kabbage, Marble, Mogo, Morningstsar, M Science, MX, Petal, Plaid, Questrade, Quicken Loans, SaltEdge, Trustly, ValidiFI, VoPay, Wealthica, Xero, and others.