Author: rebecca

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

Coalition of leading industry stakeholders voice continued support for vital Canadian Payments Act amendments

OTTAWA, October 11, 2023 — The Fall Economic Statement presents an opportunity to modernize the Canadian Payments Act to strengthen financial competition, innovation, consumer protection and economic stability.

Leaders across Canada’s payment industry continue to demonstrate unified support for amendments to the Canadian Payments Act to expand Payments Canada’s membership. This support was previously expressed through various pre-budget consultation submissions, a joint letter to the Minister of Finance and a 2018 Department of Finance consultation.

Expanded membership eligibility is essential to broaden safe access and participation on Payments Canada’s infrastructure. By broadening access to include payment service providers, credit union locals, and operators of financial market infrastructures that meet regulatory and legislative requirements, the Government of Canada will foster competition and innovation and help ensure the future of digital payments happens within — and not outside — the regulatory system.

“Payments are changing at an unprecedented rate,” said Tracey Black, President and Chief Executive Officer of Payments Canada. “Canada must evolve its payment systems and supporting legislation in parallel to deliver continued financial stability, to support increased competition and innovation and to ensure Canada remains globally competitive.”

“Payments Canada, and the regulatory framework that underpins the organization, has a long, proven history of serving Canadians’ best interests by getting money to where it needs to be, safely,” said Garry Foster, Chair of the Board of Directors of Payments Canada. “But the world is changing. Payments are changing. And innovation is happening no matter what. If we want to continue to serve Canadians in a way that reflects the level of safety and security expected from Canada’s financial system, we need to modernize the Canadian Payments Act.”

Currently, Payments Canada membership is limited to banks, credit union centrals, and select other financial institution types, including securities dealers. Membership is required to access Payments Canada’s infrastructure as a participant. Proposed changes to the Canadian Payments Act would expand membership eligibility to include payment service providers registered with the Bank of Canada, provincially regulated credit unions, and operators of financial market infrastructures designated by the Bank of Canada. To gain access to the payment systems, a Payments Canada member must meet the risk-based access and participation requirements set out in Payments Canada’s by-laws, rules and standards.

Contributed quotes

“As new technology and services continue to transform the way payments are made and processed, amending and broadening access to the Canadian Payments Act can help modernize Canada’s payment landscape. Allowing for a more diverse group of financial service providers can ensure the path is open for innovation and encourage the development of new user-friendly, accessible and cost-efficient payment solutions for small businesses. It can also foster competition within the industry, which can drive costs down and improve financial services.”
Dan Kelly, President and Chief Executive Officer
Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB)

“The most important benefits we can offer Canadian consumers are greater choice and competition within the context of a safe and well-regulated payment system. A measured approach to broadening access to Payments Canada membership, which includes effective rules and robust consumer protection, can help to create a more innovative and competitive marketplace that is good for everyone.”
Elizabeth Mulholland
Prosper Canada

“Canada has a strong record of payment innovation. At the same time, we know we must continue to update policy and regulatory frameworks to ensure they meet the needs of Canadians and support growth and competitiveness in the market. Interac supports updating the Canadian Payments Act to enable broadened participation in national payments infrastructure and will continue to work with industry stakeholders to advance opportunities for increased access on our network and products.”
Kirkland Morris, VP Enterprise Initiatives & External Affairs
Interac

“Making the financial sector work harder for its customers is a necessary part of solving Canada’s affordability crisis. Expanding access to payment systems would promote responsible competition in the financial sector, letting Canadian consumers and businesses keep more of their hard-earned money in their pockets.”
Alex Vronces, Executive Director
Fintechs Canada

“Expanding membership to Payments Canada will allow fintechs to serve on the front lines of bringing the benefits of faster payments to consumers, merchants and the economy.”
Scott Talbott, SVP, Government Affairs
Electronic Transactions Association (ETA)  

“The payment fintech industry in Canada has made commendable strides in introducing new and innovative concepts. However, there are still some elements hindering the overall progress of the sector. The lack of representation and access to these fintechs in Payments Canada’s membership is presenting certain obstacles in the discussions surrounding crucial policies and infrastructure. To overcome these hurdles, we firmly believe that expanding membership criteria is necessary. This will enable innovative fintechs to offer Canadians superior products and services, foster healthy competition, and promote innovation. Ultimately, this will help Canada remain competitive in the global fintech landscape. At Fintech Cadence, we wholeheartedly support the idea of extending membership eligibility to Payment Canada’s membership.”
Layial El-Hadi, Executive Director
Fintech Cadence

“Canada must act now to modernize payments. The amendments to the Canadian Payments Act are long overdue and necessary to enable non-bank access to the payment system. Allowing a broader group of financial service providers like Wise to become members of Payments Canada will lower payment costs while increasing speed, competition, innovation, and consumer adoption. Payment modernization will allow Canada to go from a global fintech laggard to a leader.”
Nick Catino, Global Head of Policy & Social Impact
Wise

“It is evident that the most significant innovations in payment services within Canada have been pioneered by organizations that, unfortunately, do not qualify for membership within Payments Canada. This exclusion has placed payment service providers (PSPs), such as Telpay, and their valued customers, in a highly disadvantageous position. The inability to participate in the Payments Canada network has stifled competition and hindered progress within our industry. This has resulted in a glaring disparity in access to essential payment infrastructure, directly impacting the ability of PSPs  to offer reliable and flexible solutions to their clients. We firmly believe that broadening access to these systems is not only a matter of fairness but also of economic necessity. It is our assertion that providing greater access will not only empower PSPs but also benefit end-users — both payors and payees. A more inclusive approach to payment systems will foster innovation, enhance competition, and drive the demand for more reliable and flexible payment solutions.”
John Zajic, Vice President, Corporate Policy & Compliance
Telpay

“Implementation of open banking and amendments to the Canadian Payments Act that allow a broader set of stakeholders to safely and securely gain access to Canada’s payment systems will facilitate a consumer-centric 21st century financial services marketplace. The Fall Economic Statement provides a unique opportunity to meaningfully advance both of these important initiatives and to promote innovation, competition, and a more inclusive Canadian financial services system.”
Steve Boms, Executive Director
Financial Data and Technology Association of North America

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America October Newsletter

FDATA North America Monthly Newsletter for October 2023

Welcome to FDATA North America’s monthly newsletter! These regular dispatches will share developments from our organization and our 30+ member companies, all of which are promoting financial access and inclusion with open finance use cases. We also include a list of upcoming industry events, and coverage of any market developments that impact fintech innovators. Know someone who’d like to receive these monthly updates? Send them here to sign up.

Member News & Activity

API Metrics released a blog post last week entitled “Unlocking The Unmet Potential Of Open Banking” where they discussed the ways in which open banking has yet to meet its capabilities in multiple markets and outlined recent statistics in the UK compared to geographical variations in open banking. The blog advocates for the market’s need to ensure customer trust and reliability in building an open banking infrastructure and how API Metrics continues to do so for their customers.

Basis Theory published a blog post regarding their partnership with Method Financial. In this customer story, they highlight Method’s mission to assist fintech developers integrate key functionalities like real-time financial data, repayment, balance transfers, and bill pay automation into their apps. In Basis theory, Method found a partner that could move as quickly as they moved, and ever since they have been satisfied with the ease of integration and the level of support from Basis Theory.

Codat released a study, discussed in detail in a piece in The Fintech Times, of 115 business lenders in the US and UK found that digital lenders are also seeing a rise in default rates (41 per cent), and, as a result, are tightening lending standards to manage risk. Despite economic difficulties, Codat also reveals that, “business lenders continue to innovate and evolve their offerings. Providers are adapting their strategies and priorities to narrow in focus on operational efficiency, retaining current customers and launching new lending products.”

Experian was named a market leader in fraud prevention by Liminal’s Link Index Report for Account Opening in Financial Services. The report recognizes Experian for leadership in compliance and fraud prevention capabilities. Experian’s identity verification and fraud prevention solutions received the highest Link Score out of the 32 companies highlighted in the report. It found that Experian was recognized by 94% of buyers and 89% identified Experian as a market leader.

Fiserv was named to TIME World’s Best Companies 2023 for leading global providers of payments and financial technology solutions. Fiserv was awarded this honor based on three primary dimensions: employee satisfaction, revenue growth, and sustainability.

Flinks published a article last month entitled, “Open Banking in Action – A Look at Use Cases,” where they discuss data-in use cases and data-out use cases and how how these two different types of open banking options can be put to work right away. Flinks dives into the most relevant open banking use cases for financial institutions and how FIs can upgrade their digital experiences to maximize conversions and gain a competitive advantage.

Intuit was ranked by Fortune Magazine as #5 on their 2023 Best Workplaces in Technology list. This award follows their recent launch of Intuit Assist, which reinforces their goal to cultivate a strong culture of tech innovation to solve their customers’ most important problems.

Method posted a recent blog post highlighting how the Peach app, powered by Method’s Liability APIs, delivers clear insights into debts and devises personalized repayment strategies for a debt-free future. By partnering with Method, Peach has connected more than 55k accounts, delivering a transparent view into debt management and providing step-by-step repayment strategies to help users become debt-free.

MX held their Money Experience Summit from September 19-21, which is the premier gathering of finance and fintech leaders, influencers, builders, and connectors. Stay in the loop for insightful discussions, unique networking opportunities, and one-of-a-kind experiences.

Plaid announced last month that it will be participating in FinRegLab and the Department of Commerce’s new pilot program through the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), which studies how cash flow data can improve credit access for minority-owned companies and underserved small businesses. Plaid will provide free account connectivity services to participating mission-based lenders to allow loan applicants to authorize their account data to be accessed for underwriting.

Portabl published a recent blog entitled, “What is consumer-permissioned data & how does it work?” The blog outlines that while banks and aggregators have done an impressive job shaping conventions and standards around consumer-permissioned data, Portabl offers the market the ability to bridge the gap between simpler account access and secure data sharing.

TransUnion published a recent blog titled, “Point-of-Sale Installment Loans and Your Credit,” where they show BNPL and POS installment loans can be appealing because a large purchase doesn’t have to be paid in full upfront. POS loas have been used by as many as 100 million Americans at least once in the past year, according to 2022 TransUnion Consumer Pulse research.

Trustly penned a new post for their blog entitled: “Maximizing Value Through Grocery Payments: How Open Banking Can Help,” which outlines the ways in which open banking can help grocery store merchants improve shopper experience, lower payment acceptance costs, and maximize value through payments during these more challenging economic times.

Events and Submission Deadlines

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America Responds to CFPB Data Broker SBREFA Memo

September 21, 2023, Washington, DC – Steve Boms, the Executive Director of the Financial Data and Technology Association of North America, a consortium of financial technology companies united behind the notion that consumers and small businesses should have full control over their financial data, today released the following statement in response to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) outline of proposals and alternatives under consideration by the agency ahead of its “data broker” rulemaking:

 “We welcome the CFPB’s close scrutiny of companies that collect and sell consumers’ data, often unbeknownst to the consumer, and use that data for marketing and advertising purposes.

At the same time, we are concerned that the CFPB did not distinguish in this outline between entities that collect consumer information without consumers’ informed consent and third-party providers of financial products and tools that access consumers’ data at their express direction and consistent with the CFPB’s forthcoming Section 1033 Open Banking rule. 

Entities that enable consumers to access and share their own personal financial information – at consumers’ express direction – are at the heart of open banking and empower consumer choice and control, and improve consumers’ ability to manage their financial lives. These companies should be appropriately regulated under Section 1033, including adhering to the privacy principles FDATA North America members released in March of this year.

The same principles that led to the enactment of the Fair Credit Reporting Act in 1970 – transparency and control for consumers over their financial data – are the hallmarks of customer-permissioned data access marketplace today. Accordingly, as it contemplates a proposed rule in this space, we encourage the CFPB in the strongest possible terms to distinguish between “data brokers” and third-party financial providers that access consumer data based on a consumer’s affirmative request to do so.”

FDATA North America previously responded to the CFPB’s Request for Information (RFI) Regarding Data Brokers and Other Business Practices Involving the Collection and Sale of Consumer Information, submitting a comment letter in June stressing in the strongest possible terms, that third-party providers of financial services that rely on consumer-permissioned data are not data brokers, and therefore should be exempt from any Bureau rulemakings, guidance, or other actions it may consider in the data brokerage space.

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America September Newsletter

FDATA News

FDATA North America Submits Comments to Canada’s Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) Pre-2024 Budget Consultations. Our submission stressed that Canada needs to remain diligent in its pursuit of an open banking framework, that is must recognize that other countries are rapidly implementing their own open banking regimes, and remain keenly aware that every day that passes without open banking development risks leaving Canadians further behind their international counterparts and competitors. Our letter also expressed disappointment with the lack of progress on the open banking file, and called on the government to include language in Budget 2024 to rapidly implement the recommendations that Open Banking Lead Abraham Tachjian will provide in his forthcoming final report. Our submission also called for the government to outline its approach to open finance, the next logical step after open banking, and amend the Canadian Payments Act to enable Payments Canada to expand its membership to include federally regulated payment service providers, providing access to its forthcoming real-time payment system.

Member News & Activity

APImetrics published a new blog post entitled: “Why You Need to Think of APIs as Products” which demonstrates how a product-centric approach to API development means implementing security and privacy aspects right from the design phase through well after deployment.

Codat published a new blog post entitled: “Why big banks are finally making moves in business banking” which explained how small business borrowers can increase their access to credit by connecting and permissioning their deposit account data to SMB lenders.

Envestnet Data and Analytics hosted a webinar entitled” Open Banking Around the World” which outlined the evolution of open banking and open finance in several countries across the globe. It also featured discussion of the different paths countries have taken toward open banking accreditation, and described the use cases – like lending, payment initiation, personal finance, and more – that have been successful in each region.

Fiserv was recently recognized by CNBC in the Digital Payments Category of its “World Top Fintech Companies” list for the depth and breadth of capabilities it provides merchants and financial institutions, including solutions that enable digital commerce, digital money transfers, and mobile payments.

GoCardless has announced it is renewing its strategic partnership with fellow FDATA North America member Xero, the global small business platform, for another five years. The agreement builds on a long-term relationship which started in 2016, focused on helping small businesses get paid faster. For GoCardless this also represents a doubling down in the accountancy space, a key sector for the fintech as it executes on its ambitious growth plans.

Method was named a finalist in the PayTech Start-up of the Year category at the PayTech Awards USA 2023. Additionally, their founding software engineer Mustafa Ali spoke at Fintech Devcon on the importance of idempotency in building resilient, dependable APIs, and why adopting an idempotent-first mindset is vital for API-first companies.

MX published a new blog post and whitepaper entitled: “How Open Finance Improves Security,” which explain how consumer-permissioned data access leads to more consumer control and awareness of their financial data, as well as allowing for modern data security methods, particularly account access without the use of usernames and passwords.

Plaid’s Global Head of Policy John Pitts joined the “Breaking Banks” show along with Jonah Crane, partner at Klaros Group, and Dara Tarkowsi, partner at Actuate Law, to discuss open finance, the recent Interagency Guidance on Third Party Due Diligence from U.S. regulators, and how fintechs that are third-party bank partners must understand the importance of this guidance and prepare themselves for more interaction with regulators in the future.

Trustly’s Director of Regulatory and Public Affairs, Matt Janiga, joined Harold Levey at Pymnts to discuss the CFPB ‘s proposed rules and standards coming in October and the landscape of Open Banking regulation in the US. Matt put this latest regulatory work in context by explaining how laws designed to protect consumer information have been on the books for decades, and how the spirit of those laws is tied to a basic principle: If companies are sharing your data — whether it’s with another company or even the government — you should have some right to know about it and also to know what information the company has about you.

Vaultree’s CEO and founder Hamed Arbabi penned an article for the Forbes Technology Council entitled: “How To Better Support Gig Workers Through Payment Modernization,” which how payment modernization, particularly on payroll systems, is critical for providing gig workers the financial services needed to meet their work circumstances.

Events and Submission Deadlines

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America Submits Comments to Canada’s Standing Committee on Finance Pre-2024 Budget Consultations

August 3, 2023, Washington, DC – 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 2024 budget. Our submission stressed that Canada needs to remain diligent in its pursuit of an open banking framework which will provide Canadians much needed relief in banking fees and other expenses, that Canada must recognize that other countries are rapidly implementing their own open banking regimes, and remain keenly aware that every day that passes without open banking development risks leaving Canadians further behind their international counterparts and competitors.

Our letter also expressed disappointment with the lack of progress on the open banking file, and called on the government to:

  • Include language in Budget 2024 to implement the recommendations that Open Banking Lead Abraham Tachjian will provide in his forthcoming final report and rapidly implement Canada’s open banking system, including funding for the development of a neutral, transparent, and nimble governance function;
  • Include language in Budget 2024 outlining the government’s 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; and
  • Amend the Canadian Payments Act to enable Payments Canada to expand its membership to include federally regulated payment service providers, providing access to its forthcoming real-time payment system.

In the submission, we 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 here.

 

 

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America August Newsletter

Member News & Activity

Basis Theory CEO and Co-Founder Colin Luce, wrote a guest post for Forbes outlining the four most important steps that fintech startups should be taking to secure their payment systems and unlock the value of their data. Basis Theory has also launched an Artificial Intelligence powered “Compliance Genie” in partnership with kapa.ai which can provide instant access to payments expertise and quickly sift through card network rules and get instant answers to regulatory questions.

Codat published a new blog post entitled “Can you really trust your customers’ accounting data?” which detailed how accounting data is more reliable than filed accounts and tax returns when it comes to evaluating a business’s creditworthiness. The post explains that many businesses update their accounting records much more regularly than their tax information, which can give a more accurate and up-to-date picture of a borrower’s creditworthiness at the time of application.

Envestnet Data and Analytics President Farouk Ferchichi penned an article in Finextra entitled:” Embracing Open Banking for Small Banks” which provided an overview of open banking, the importance open banking for smaller banks, and the upcoming Section 1033 rulemaking from the CFPB.

Fiserv’s Director of Communications Chase Wallace penned an article for their website entitled: “Accelerating the Pace of Innovation” which explained how the company sees the increasing use of AI and data affecting the financial services marketplace, and how Fiserv will be part of this transformation, particularly via deployment of its “easy-to-use APIs” which can “give credit unions and community banks a competitive edge.”

Inverite published a new post on their website entitled: “What is Data Aggregation” which explained data aggregation and aggregators, how it works, and how it can benefit businesses.

Method Co-Founder and COO Mit Shah penned a guest post in Fintech Nexus entitled: “It’s a rate-shopping environment: Do you have the data to compete?” which explored how open banking data and the upcoming Section 1033 rule from the CFPB will pose new challenges and opportunities in today’s rate-shopping environment, particularly in promoting a more competitive marketplace and empowering financial institutions to offer hyper-personalized products and services. He also shared data from a recent Financial Health Network study which showed that customers are three times more likely to be satisfied with their primary financial institution if they feel their institution truly cares about their financial wellness, and five times more likely to purchase additional products from their financial institution in the future.

MX has partnered with Finastra, a global provider of financial software applications and marketplaces to provide more seamless, personalized money experiences by integrating MX’s Personal Financial Management (PFM), Insights, and Account Aggregation solutions with Finastra’s Fusion Digital Banking solution. This partnership will enable more than 150 financial institutions using the Fusion Digital Banking solution to provide consumers with a robust set of PFM and financial wellness tools, including budgeting and debt management, personalized, proactive insights based on their spending and saving behaviors, and the ability to create a consolidated view of their finances by connecting all of their financial accounts.

Plaid’s Head of Public Policy John Pitts joined the Open Views podcast to discuss the story of open finance, highlighting how it has been driven by consumer demand rather than regulatory intervention. He also covers how, over time, banks have formed deep partnerships with open finance companies such as Plaid, signaling their willingness to adapt and meet consumer demands. John also discussed how regulators are crucial in shaping open finance regulations to protect consumers and foster innovation, the importance of trust and regulation in the financial services industry, and how open finance is seen as a solution to expand access to credit, particularly for credit-invisible individuals.

Trustly’s Matt Janiga, Legal Counsel, Director of Regulatory and Public Affairs, penned a new post for their blog entitled: “Open Banking Update: CFPB Regulation” which gives an overview of what open banking is, recent interest from members of Congress, and how the CFPB’s Section 1033 rule will implement it. Trustly CEO Alex Gonthier also joined PYMTS CEO Karen Webster to discuss the state, and future potential of real-time payments driven by open banking.

Vaultree Co-Founder and CEO Ryan Lasmaili joined the Bospar PR show Politely Pushy with Eric Chemi for a conversation on data privacy, cybersecurity challenges and his personal journey: from financial mathematics, to personally being a victim of data hacking, and leading the company that has pioneered the world’s first Fully Functional Data-In-Use Encryption (FFDUE).

Xero’s  Head of Government Experience Mike Cascone penned an article for Canadian SME entitled: “Open Banking and how Canada stands to benefit from it” which gave a strong overview of what open banking is and particularly how small and medium sized businesses can benefit from it.

Events and Submission Deadlines

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America July Newsletter

FDATA NA News

FDATA North America Responds to CFPB Data Broker RFI. In response to the CFPB’s Request for Information (RFI) Regarding Data Brokers, we submitted a comment letter stressing in the strongest possible terms, that third-party providers of financial services that rely on consumer-permissioned data are not data brokers, and therefore should be exempt from any Bureau rulemakings, guidance, or other actions it may consider in the data brokerage space. We also used this opportunity to further deploy our FDATA Privacy Principles which define customer-directed data as financial data that is collected or shared in accordance with a clear affirmative action by or request from an end user or their authorized agent, rather than data collected passively, such as data that may be collected automatically through pixels or cookies as a consumer navigates through web pages. Finally, the letter reiterated our long-standing positions that no third party should have access to any financial data element permissioned by a customer that is not required to fuel the use case for which that customer has opted in, and that the CFPB should expand its supervisory authority to cover data aggregators.

Member News & Activity

Codat published a blog post entitled “5 reasons you need accounting data for your liquidity assessments” which explained how Small and Medium sized businesses (SMBs) can boost their credit applications by sharing not only their bank information, but also accounting data, since accounting data can provide more granular insights into a business’s liquidity and lets the applicant demonstrate how many bank accounts they have,and the total revenue held in each one.

Envestnet Yodlee has announced a customer-permissioned data sharing agreement with American Express. This new API integration will provide new digital banking options for customers and allow them to more easily leverage their American Express account information to better manage their personal finances and business expenses through secure connections with a variety of third-party applications. This integration eliminates the need for credential sharing, improves data accuracy and reliability, and accelerates financial data access.

GoCardless’ Ben Morfoot, Director of Product Management was recently interviewed on Fintech Futures North American Edition’s “What the Fintech” podcast. Ben and FinTech Futures editor Paul Hindle discuss how businesses can utilize bank payments and their key use cases, how advancements in embedded finance and open banking have enabled payment service providers to offer these methods to meet growing demand, and what the future looks like for the digital payments space.

Fiserv CEO Frank Bisignano joined Intercontinental Exchange’s “Inside the ICE House” podcast to talk about the future of payments, navigating mergers and how Fiserv’s Clover platform transforms small businesses. Frank shared his story of rising through the ranks of Wall Street, riding a phoenix through the rebirth of First Data, and the future the FinTech Revolution.

Method published a new blog post from its Co-Founder and COO Mit Shah entitled “The Critical Importance of Liability Account Inclusion in the CFPB’s 1033 Rule.” This piece detailed how Method’s technology can help solve the challenges faced by un-and-underbanked Americans, particularly in rural areas, and how the upcoming CFPB Section 1033 rule can help expand and democratize access to modern payment methods and affordable credit.

M Science CEO  Michael V. Marrale delivered a keynote address at Finovate Spring, where he discussed how M Science is leveraging data and artificial intelligence to help clients outperform and how data is the big winner in an AI driven world.

MX announced that it has partnered with iuvity, a cloud-first digital banking and open service platform provider to enable secure data sharing and financial account aggregation within iuvity’s digital banking platform. Through this partnership, iuvity’s clients will be able to leverage MX’s open finance APIs to provide their customers with a more secure and reliable data sharing experience and power insights to help customers meet their financial goals.

Plaid partnered with MIT Technology Review on an article and report entitled “Open finance heralds a new era: Fintech innovations may hold the key to increasing customer demands, evolving regulatory reform, and ample opportunity.” This piece gives an overview of open banking, how it expands financial access and inclusion, and how it can empower the use of alternative data to improve credit scores and access.

Trustly CBO Craig McDonald joined Austin Prey at Pymnts for a Fireside Chat on Account-to-Account (A2A) payments, how they can offer more value, and why they go hand in hand with Open Banking. McDonald explained that while real-time rails have the potential to disrupt the status quo, open banking is key to unlocking their full potential, saying “all of these things coming together, open banking, the regulatory framework, real-time rails, and the data to be able to adjudicate a transaction in real-time will provide merchants with what they really want — a positive authorization response, great UX, great conversion, low cost and a non-refutable transaction.”

Validify has been acquired by Ribbit, Inc, a provider of alternative bank and payment data. The acquisition will create a leading banking and payment data solutions platform with the largest alternative database of bank and payment data in the marketplace. The companies expect that RIBBIT’s predictive analytics and data assets combined with ValidiFI’s verification and compliance solutions will expand the breadth and depth of products and services offered.

Vaultree CEO Ryan Lasmaili penned his inaugural article as a Forbes Councils Member entitled “Resistance Is Not Futile: How To Fight Cybersecurity Complacency” which highlights fully functional Data-In-Use encryption, the necessity of “compliance over complacency” and describes how end-to-end encryption can be implemented.

Vopay published a new blog post entitled “How Real-Time Payment APIs are Transforming Payroll Software” which describes how real-time API’s work, why they are becoming more popular, how they can help meet the growing needs of the gig economy and demand for faster payouts and early wage access.

Xero CEO Sukhinder Singh Cassidy joined Bloomberg Technology to discuss the global outlook for tech, the state of cloud adoption, where Xero is headed and its competition with Quickbooks. She also gave a more personal interview for this piece in The Star, where she discussed her life background and goals for the company.

Events and Submission Deadlines

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America Responds to CFPB Data Broker RFI

June 16, 2023, Washington, DC – In response to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) Request for Information (RFI) Regarding Data Brokers and Other Business Practices Involving the Collection and Sale of Consumer Information, FDATA North America submitted comment letter stressing in the strongest possible terms, that third-party providers of financial services that rely on consumer-permissioned data are not data brokers, and therefore should be exempt from any Bureau rulemakings, guidance, or other actions it may consider in the data brokerage space.

We also used this opportunity to further deploy our FDATA Privacy Principles which define customer-directed data as financial data that is collected or shared in accordance with a clear affirmative action by or request from an end user or their authorized agent, rather than data collected passively, such as data that may be collected automatically through pixels or cookies as a consumer navigates through web pages. For data to be considered customer-directed, our principles further assert that the end user must also have full utility over any non-proprietary data element for which a data holder holds about them. And critically, our principles state that the end user must have the ability to opt-out of future use of their data at any time.

Finally, the letter reiterated our long-standing positions that no third party should have access to any financial data element permissioned by a customer that is not required to fuel the use case for which that customer has opted in, and that the CFPB should expand its supervisory authority to cover data aggregators.

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

FDATA North America June Newsletter

FDATA NA News

FDATA North America Welcomes Newest Member Portabl. FDATA North America’s newest member is Portabl, and company that is solving for reusable, privacy-preserving identity for use in the open finance ecosystem. By allowing end users to aggregate and share different types of identity and reputation information, Portabl is building trusted identity networks and simplifying and automating many parts of the identity compliance stack.

FDATA Holds Inaugural Open Finance Summit in Ottawa. FDATA North America hosted a first-of-its kind Open Finance Summit in Ottawa, Ontario on May 17th. The half day event in the Canadian capital city featured several panels of subject matter experts from FDATA member companies, FDX, Finance Canada, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner, and Canadian financial institutions. Attendees also heard keynote remarks from Ron Morrow, Executive Director of Retail Payments Supervision, Bank of Canada and from Abraham Tachjian, Canada’s Open Banking Lead.

Member News & Activity

Basis Theory CEO Colin Luce spent a few minutes in a recent New York Stock Exchange Floor Talk to explain their use cases, company beginnings, and shared the common challenges their customers face and they support them in this ever-changing regulatory environment.

Codat CTO David Hoare joined the Fintech Blueprint podcast to discuss data aggregation, API integrations, breaking down the requirements involved in integrating Codat into small business’ stack, and expanding on Codat’s partnership program with large enterprises.

Envestnet Yodlee’s Data and Analytics has partnered with Axway, the provider of Amplify Open Banking, to provide consistent API access via the FDX (Financial Data Exchange) standard, eliminating the need for proprietary APIs. “Our partnership with Axway will help shorten the time it takes to connect to financial institutions, and subsequently onboard partners, allowing consumers to quickly access their financial data via a secure, common API,” explains Lisa Novier, Head of Governance, Risk and Compliance for Envestnet Data and Analytics. “This seamless flow of data helps us give people and small-to-medium size businesses stronger control over sharing their financial data with third-party financial service providers and receive a more complete view of their financial lives.”

GoCardless has partnered with Bluefort, an independent software vendor and Microsoft solutions partner, to offer a simple way for businesses to manage their billing, payments and accounting directly within Dynamics 365. This integration, available for free through Bluefort’s payment automation platform Bluefort TAPP, will enable Dynamics 365 users across Finance & Supply Chain Management, Dynamics for Sales and Business Central to access Direct Debit and open banking payments, in addition to automatic reconciliation.

Fiserv’s Sunil Sachdev and Matt Wilcox of Fiserv spoke with FinTech Magazine about helping clients bring new financial innovations to market and crafting new digital experiences using open finance.

Morningstar ByAllAccounts Head of the Data Aggregation Strategy and Governance Brian Costello spoke with Tara Unverzagt, President of South Bay Financial Partners at the Morningstar Investment Conference discussing how data aggregation can build great trust between advisors and their clients. Read the retrospective from the moderator Craig Iskowitz, CEO of Ezra Group on the WealthTech Today blog.

Method’s Co-Founder Mit Shah dives into why the CFPB should consider alternatives to authenticate third-party permissioned data access that are safe & secure, and eliminate the need for firms to invest in expensive technological overhauls in a recent piece in the American Banker.

M Science CEO Michael V. Marrale spoke at the Finovate Spring conference on how data can offer valuable insights, and how AI can assist customers in making better business decisions.

MX’s Chief Advocacy Officer Jane Barratt joined the “Banking Transformed” podcast with Jim Marous to discuss how data and insight can transform banking into emotional relationships that can impact people, organizations, and communities.

Petal announced $35 million in new funding, raised in the most difficult technology funding environment in a decade, and announced that it has spun off its Prism Data cash flow underwriting product into an independent company. Prism Data’s open banking infrastructure and analytics platform helps clients improve underwriting capabilities, minimize first-party fraud, and better manage servicing of their portfolios. To date, Prism’s CashScore has been used to inform nearly $2 billion in real-world credit originations for hundreds of thousands of consumers.

Plaid was featured in a Bloomberg Markets Magazine piece which delved into its corporate history, product development, and its role in establishing open banking in the US. The piece also highlighted how Plaid has been working to move away from controversial screen scraping methods, with over 75 percent of its connections now facilitated by APIs.

Trustly recently published The Ultimate Guide to Real-Time Payments, which details the latest trends on RTP and an overview of its current impact globally and in the US. Trustly also released three new blogs: Fraud Prevention in Open Banking, What is Nacha, and Key Learnings from FIS’ 2023 Global Payments Report. Trustly will also partake in a webinar with Cross River Bank about the evolution of faster payments and how FedNow will expand RTP and business growth opportunities. The webinar will take place on June 20th at 9 AM PST, pre-register here.

Vopay recently published a new post on its blog entitled “Definitive Guide To ACH Payments: What Are They and How Do They Work?” This detailed guide includes several handy infographics and goes through the nuts and bolts of ACH systems, the differences between it and other payment methods, how Vopay is involved with this system, and explains some business uses cases and benefits.

Xero Chief Growth Officer Chris O’Neill published an opinion piece in TechRadar Pro entitled: “How SMBs can fast-forward digitalization to support increased productivity.” The piece laid out how small-and-medium sized business can benefit from optimal tech stack and app integration services to streamline their payroll, tax, and accounting practices.

Events and Submission Deadlines

by rebecca rebecca No Comments

Video Member Spotlight: Portabl

Nate Soffio, Co-Founder and CEO of Portabl describes how Portabl’s technology is simplifying online user identification and reducing friction within the open banking ecosystem:

Top