Following the publication of an issues paper on ‘Blockchain Technology and Competition Policy’ by the Organisation for Economic Co-operations and Development (‘OECD’) in April 2018, Dimitris Sinaniotis, Legal Director at TLT LLP, provides insight into the OECD’s paper and the possible competition law concerns that could arise as use of the blockchain evolves. / read more

Amendments to Japan’s Banking Act in 2016 and 2017 have enabled banks to form or acquire FinTech companies and, in order to promote collaboration between banks and FinTech companies or subsidiaries, also imposed an obligation on banks to make efforts to open up their application programming interfaces (‘APIs’). It is expected that, through subsidiaries jointly funded by banks and FinTech companies, or through collaboration with FinTech companies that are external third parties, these changes will help to advance Open Banking in Japan. Naoki Kanehisa and Kenichi Tanizaki of Atsumi & Sakai, provide details on the impact of the amendments to Japan’s Banking Act and the development of Open Banking in the country. / read more

The Bank of England (‘BoE’) published a consultation paper ‘A Global Standard to Modernise UK Payments’ in June 2018, seeking views on its proposed strategy for aligning payment messages across the main interbank payments systems in the UK (CHAPS, Bacs and Faster Payments) with the international standard ISO 20022. Banks and other payment service providers (‘PSPs’) who are direct or indirect participants in the payments systems should consider the proposals in the light of current core systems and processes and prepare for change, as Roger Tym and Jennifer Staniforth of Hogan Lovells, explain. / read more

UK Finance, the Financial Data and Technology Association, techUK and the Electronic Money Association have jointly published voluntary guidelines and encouraged market behaviours (the ‘Guidelines’) under the EU’s revised Payment Services Directive (‘PSD2’). The main aims of the Guidelines are to “foster a collaborative and cooperative industry ecosystem around account information services and payment initiation services,” to increase customer protection in areas such as “credential sharing” and “screen scraping” and to promote the use of PSD2 compliant APIs, in accordance with industry aims. The Guidelines’ application extends to all firms that both operate in the UK and are authorised or registered under PSD2 as Account Servicing Payment Service Providers (‘ASPSPs’), Account Information Service Providers (‘AISPs’) or Payment Initiation Service Providers (‘PISPs’) (as well as those pre-12 January 2016 ‘grace period’ firms - see below). Ben Regnard-Weinrabe, Heenal Vasu, Martin Dowdall and Hannah Pack of Allen & Overy LLP, discuss the Guidelines in detail and why they are important. / read more

Kenya’s financial services landscape is poised to undergo sweeping legislative change intended to protect consumers from predatory credit practices, among other things, and level the lending playing field, while supporting financial innovation and competition. John Syekei and Eddah Kiai of Bowmans, discuss the growth in the consumer credit market instigated by FinTechs, the concerns that have led to the drafting of one of the most far-reaching pieces of legislation in the financial sector in Kenya - the Financial Markets Conduct Bill 2018, and the likely impact of the draft Bill on FinTechs and traditional financial services players. / read more

In Ukraine, FinTech is beginning to take off with more than 60 firms at different stages of maturity. Sergii Papernyk, Head of Banking & Finance/FinTech at Evris Law Firm, provides insight into the legal and regulatory landscape for FinTech in Ukraine and the recent developments that are likely to boost the industry. / read more

Although it boasts one of the world’s largest FinTech ecosystems, the US lags behind other major countries in providing a cohesive and consistent regulatory framework for FinTechs. Some US regulators have realised the need to act, launching initiatives with the aim of easing compliance burdens. But, the lack of coordination among federal as well as state regulators has spurred myriad conflicting statements, fragmented initiatives, and varying interpretations, all of which have inhibited the development of a comprehensive and uniform regulatory framework. This, as Ben Saul and Margaux Curie of White & Case explain, is the conclusion the US Government Accountability Office (‘GAO’) reached in its Financial Technology Report (‘Report’). Ben and Margaux use the GAO Report as a springboard to evaluate FinTech regulation in the US, in terms of policy, implementation and future directions. / read more

Ana Botin, the Executive Chairman of Santander, expressed her view that Europe’s payments rules are unfair because the requirements that force banks to provide third party access to customer data are not similarly imposed on the large technology companies that will benefit from Open Banking in an article published by the Financial Times on 17 April 2018. Dave Birch, Member of the Payments & FinTech Lawyer Editorial Board, shares Botin’s concerns, and in this opinion piece shares his thoughts on the potential for the Open Banking model to be used as a remedy against monopolies in data. / read more

The Reserve Bank of India (‘RBI’) issued on 6 April 2018 a Notification on the Storage of Payment System Data, which requires amongst other things that all payment system providers ensure that all of the data relating to payment systems operated by them are only stored in a system in India. For the ‘foreign leg of the transaction,’ the data can also be stored in the foreign country, if required. Vaibhav Parikh, Aaron Kamath and Abhishek Senthilnathan of Nishith Desai Associates, discuss the new data localisation requirements in India relating to payment systems and the areas of ambiguity. / read more

The People’s Bank of China (‘PBOC’) announced on 19 March 2018 that the ban on foreign non-financial institutions accessing the Chinese online payments and settlements market would be lifted following the implementation of the Announcement on Matters Relating to Foreign-funded Payment Institutions (the ‘Announcement’). The Chinese payments market has been experiencing strong growth since the establishment of the payment business licensing system in 2010. Several Chinese institutions have begun providing payment services worldwide. Meanwhile, foreign players are eager to participate in this fast growing market. Kevin Wang and Sarah Wang of CMS China in this article provide insight into the likely impact of the Announcement on the Chinese payments market, and how interested businesses should go about obtaining a payment business licence to operate in China. / read more