September 26, 2022, 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 2023 budget.
In its comments, FDATA North America called on the government to:
- Include language in Budget 2023 asserting the importance of governance in an open banking framework, and that any open banking governance entity must be neutral, transparent, and nimble;
- Allocate sufficient and sustained funding in Budget 2023 towards the implementation of an open banking framework and governance entity; and
- Include language in Budget 2023 outlining its approach to Open Finance, the next logical step after Open Banking, and the framework needed to truly unlock market innovation and competition to benefit Canadian consumers and businesses. This includes an amendment to the Canadian Payments Act to grant federally regulated payment service providers access to Payment Canada’s forthcoming real-time retail payment system and make them eligible for membership in Payments Canada.
In the submission, FDATA NA also asserted that any open banking governance entity in Canada must be neutral (i.e. not controlled by any particular stakeholder(s) with commercial interests in the ecosystem), transparent (i.e. it invites and considers stakeholder input and subjects its decisions to an open, publicly visible process), and nimble (i.e. capable of making binding decisions relatively quickly and without undue bureaucracy), with all stakeholders in the open banking system agreeing to comply with the decisions and determinations made by the open banking governance entity as a condition of being active in the market.
A full copy of the submission is available below:
FDATA North America 2023 Pre-Budget Consultations