Open Banking Blog
Company Updates, Interviews, Ecosystem Breakdowns & Technology Articles
Follow Us On Twitter or LinkedInVariable Recurring Payments (VRPs)
Variable Recurring Payments (VRPs) are the most significant development in open banking to date. Why? Because they tackle one of its biggest challenges: the requirement for consent via Strong Customer Authentication (SCA) for every transaction.
The FinTech Revolution In China
A look into the impact of financial technology in China, from economic development to mass surveillance. What will be the new normal for fintech in China?
November 29th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
The Power of White Label Fintech Services
In a world where financial services are rapidly evolving, and consumers demand more convenience, white-label fintech services could be the way forward.
November 22th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
Lydia And Bitpanda Partner To Improve Access To Digital...
Access to digital assets in France has become easier than ever before thanks to Bitpanda and Lydia joining forces. With both companies partnering and expanding their services to provide a full spectrum of financial services with Bitpanda's respective technology and competitive pricing, they are well-positioned to challenge traditional banks for market share.
November 15th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
Carbon Emissions Tracking w/ Greenly
The US Green Deal and the new “EU taxonomy for sustainable activities” are putting pressure on businesses to manage their carbon emissions. The obligation to set GHG emissions targets is now trickling down from large corporations to their suppliers. However, it is currently hard, especially for SMEs, to measure carbon emissions.
Challengers: Interview with Hiroki Takeuchi, CEO and Co...
In this installment of the Challengers series, Rodolfo Passeri spoke with Hiroki Takeuchi, CEO and Co-founder at GoCardless, a payment company that makes collecting payments by direct debit easy for everyone.
November 8th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
Why B2B Payments Are Going To Look Completely Different...
B2B payments have comparatively failed to innovate as quickly as B2C payments. Chip-and-pin terminals, contactless cards, and card-on-file solutions employed by companies like Uber and Amazon have increased convenience and eliminated the need for cash.
Challengers: Interview with Ralph Rogge, CEO and Co-fou...
In this installment of the Challengers series, Rodolfo Passeri spoke with Ralph Rogge, CEO and Co-founder at Crezco, a free open banking payment solution designed for online invoice payments.
Embedded Fintech Versus Embedded Banking
Understand the key differences between embedded fintech and embedded banking.
5 Personal Finance Management Apps You Better Know Abou...
A look at the 5 personal finance management apps you better know about.
October 25th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
November 1st: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
The Debit Card Boom
A look at how debit cards are becoming ‘a democratizing force'.
October 18th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
Challengers: Todd Clyde, CEO at Token
In this installment of the Challengers series, Rodolfo Passeri spoke with Todd Clyde, the CEO of Token, an open banking payments platform driving the shift from card to bank payments with best-in-class, Pan-European bank connectivity, data and compliance capabilities.
How FinTech Is Changing The Insurance Industry
A look at how FinTech is changing the insurance industry.
October 11th: Weekly Newsletter
We're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
Challengers: Panagiotis Kriaris, Head of Business Devel...
In this installment of the Challengers series, Rodolfo Passeri spoke with Panagiotis Kriaris, the Head of Business Development at Unzer, an innovative and modular platform for international payment transactions.
Banking As A Service Explained With Cookies
Formally, BaaS is where a bank offers some of its core capabilities and its regulated infrastructure as a service to third parties for a fee. These capabilities could be compliance, KYC, identity, payments, accounts, risk management and much more. Since explaining BaaS may be challenging, I will borrow [Dov Marmor](https://www.linkedin.com/in/dovmarmor/)'s "The Fintech Cookie Factory" example.
Challengers: Gareth Gumbley, Frollo
In this installment of the Challengers series, Rodolfo Passeri spoke with Gareth Gumbley, the founder and CEO of Frollo, an Australian-based fintech that aims at improving people's lives through increased financial wellbeing. Gareth and Rodolfo discussed about Frollo, how it helps users, the degree of development of Open Banking in Australia, and much more.
Open Banking Powered Home Loans w/ Nano
Nano, the future of home loans, a look at how Open Banking is making possible to have cheap loans available in less than 10 minutes.
5 Reasons Why Apple May Be Your Next Bank
A look at the five reasons why Apple may be interested in becoming a financial service provider and why it would be extremely successful in doing so.
How BNPL is Changing the Payment Market
Buy now, pay later is a financing arrangement that allows consumers to make purchases without paying for them all at once. Several companies, including Klarna and Affirm, offer buy now and pay later financing on purchases made from participating merchants. Also, Paypal has introduced its point of sale installment loan program.
September 20: Weekly Newsletter
First of all, we want to thank you all for allowing us to reach 1000 followers on our Linkedin page! On top of this, we're back with a slate of content hotter than ever!! We have a lot to share this week and hope you're ready for all of our announcements!
5 Wealth Management Startups You Better Keep An Eye On
We have a lot to share is this blog as part of our passion to continue providing you with industry-leading information on the global Open Banking segment. This update will have the weekly additions to the Open Banking Tracker (Banks, APIs, TPPs, etc.) and a look at the 5 wealth management startups you better keep an eye on.
Open Banking in Switzerland
We have a lot to share is this blog as part of our passion to continue providing you with industry-leading information on the global Open Banking segment. This update will have the weekly additions to the Open Banking Tracker (Banks, APIs, TPPs, etc.) and a look at how Open Banking is making waves in Switzerland.
August 30: Weekly Newsletter
We have a lot to share is this blog as part of our passion to continue providing you with industry-leading information on the global Open Banking segment. This update will have the weekly additions to the Open Banking Tracker (Banks, APIs, TPPs, etc.) and 5 reasons why Apple could be your bank in the future.
5 API Aggregators You’ll Want To Make Sure You Know Abo...
A look at the five emerging markets API aggregators you must absolutely know about! Gain insight on these five aggregators and understand how they work, where they are based, what valuation they currently have and much more.
TrueLayer Raises $130m to Accelerate Open Banking Payme...
The round forms part of the recent tsunami of investor interest in open banking, the infrastructure that allows banking data to be shared with third parties and underpins account to account payments. TrueLayer is a fintech company that helps software developers build their financial applications by providing abstractions and connections to banks and financial institutions worldwide.
Challengers: Will Billingsley, ApTap
Will Billingsley is a young founder who's looking to disrupt the bill management space with Aptap. They're building bill management tools that let customers cancel, compare, switch or sign up to services with just a few taps.
Jul 12, 2021: Financial Advice w/ Multiply
Coaching the user into financially wise spending habits to get the user into their dream homes faster.
Jul 26, 2021: Open Banking in Russia!
REgulator approves first open banking fintech in Russia
Jul 5, 2021: Open Banking App Store Update
We've had the great pleasure to be inundated with requests from app developers to be listed and we're excited to continue building out this app store!
App Store Launch - 120+ Open Banking Powered Apps
The Open Banking Tracker is launching openbankingusecases.com, an app store covering the various apps and use cases made possible by open banking.
Jun 21, 2021: Saving Cents w/ Peaks
It is truly a ‘set and forget’ type of investment where the user doesn’t have to make decisions about budgeting and portfolio allocation, making investing a more inclusive practice.
Jun 14, 2021: Carbon Tracking w/ Enfuce
This tool can also educate users about which activities are particularly carbon-intensive and help consumers make carbon-wise purchasing decisions.
Jun 7, 2021: Int. Tuition Payments w/ PayMyTuition
Open Banking payments happen at the account level, the student’s ID is correctly identified by the university receiving the money through their banking service provider when the payment request gets generated.
May 31, 2021: Open Banking KYC w/ Plaid
The solution must be to simplify the KYC process to reduce the number of abandoned account openings, and companies like Plaid are using Open Banking to do just that.
May 24, 2021: Cutting Bills w/ Snoop
Then the AI can match individual payments with deals available in the user’s area, so the user can be aware of most of the money-saving opportunities available to them.
May 10, 2021: Sustainable Statements w/ Kivra
If you provide them a way to live a more sustainable life that also simplifies their life, then the switch is much easier to make.
Apr 26, 2021: Auto Finance w/ Blue Motor Finance
Implementing Open Banking into auto lending decisions creates value at every step in the vehicle purchasing process.
Apr 19, 2021: Invoice Factoring w/ MarketFinance
The invoice factoring practice has been in existence for millennia, and an integral part of helping businesses unlock the liquidity held in their accounts receivable.
Apr 12, 2021: Improving Employee Experience w/ Perkbox
Companies that are among the heaviest investors in EX are over four times as likely to be included in the top employers' lists on Glassdoor or LinkedIn.
Apr 5, 2021: Open Banking Gambling Protection w/ Monzo
The new payments paradigm bypasses the established payments networks and the associated codes that identify the recipient as a gambling venue.
Challengers: Craig J. Lewis, GigWage
Besides the inconvenience factor of not having an adequate payroll system for the 65-75 million people employed by the gig economy, many of these workers who typically are living off of each paycheck...
Mar 29, 2021: Open Banking Commercial Credit w/ Kabbage
Open Banking liberates account data, giving ownership over it to the account owner, and paves the way for an overhaul in how SMEs apply for and access new credit to grow their business.
Mar 22, 2021: Open Banking Mortgages w/ Mojo Mortgages
By integrating Open Banking data into the mortgage application, the lender can get a much clearer picture of what is truly affordable for the borrower.
Challengers: Vedanarayanan Vedantham, Razorpay
There is still a lot of grey around topics like Neo Banking which is better understood and regulated in the developed market.
Mar 15, 2021: Open Banking Customer Loyalty w/ Goloyal
Open Banking is a logical step in this data collection process because it adds another dimension of insight into customer shopping patterns.
Challengers: Dmitrii Barbasura, Salt Edge
At the end of the day, the one question that truly counts is why do we need Open Banking? We need it to solve end-users' problems. Not banks’ problems. Not financial institutions’ problems. End-users’ problems.
Mar 08, 2021: Open Banking Accounting w/ Freshbooks
What makes Open Finance such a fantastic industry is because it brings simplification to the most tedious tasks.
Challengers: João Bezerra Leite
Large banks should be “the Financial API Marketplace”. It’s impossible to compete. They must join the fintech world.
Mar 01, 2021: Open Banking & Personal Financial Managem...
We were all told that a budget is crucial to our financial well-being, but in practice, very few of us spend time developing one because it is time-consuming and just not that exciting.
Challengers: Caren Schwannauer, Mason Alexander
This week we had the chance to get some insight into the staffing challenges that FinTechs are facing as they scale from Caren Schwannauer of Mason Alexander FinTech.
Feb 22, 2021: Open Banking Security
The Cloudentity Authorization Control Plane is a hybrid-cloud API Dynamic Authorization Solution that delivers policy automation and governance for Zero Trust exchanges between applications, users, services, and data. This facilitates secure and confidential data exchange for high-value transactions.
Feb 15, 2021: Tax Collection w/ Ecospend
Currently, taxpayers must open their banking software and manually set up a bank transfer payment, opening the possibility that an incorrect reference gets used for payment. Under the new system, payments will be sent directly from a payer’s bank account, using validated HMRC details to address fat finger errors.
Feb 01, 2021: Open Banking Debt Collection w/ Lowell
While some financial institutions' functions may get through the pandemic and return to something approaching normal, this cannot happen in debt collection, and the mortgage sector, in particular, will face some long-term challenges.
Jan 25, 2021: Open Banking BNPL w/ Zilch
And as the number of cash-strapped people accessing BNPL services has skyrocketed throughout the pandemic, it’s essential not to allow users to get overleveraged with such schemes.
Jan 18, 2021: Open Banking for Sustainability?
One may argue that the advances in sustainable finance are due, in no small part, to the same technological advances that drive open banking – more openly available data and more demand for inclusion.
Dec 21, 2020: Open Banking Wealth Management w/ Plaid
As these apps become more prevalent and offer an ever-expanding suite of services, the wealth management industry can make account information available through APIs, which means that users could access their checking, savings, mortgage, and investment accounts from a single application.
Dec 14, 2020: What are the use cases for open banking?
For open banking to expand, understanding the potential use cases and being able to build viable products that leverage new use cases will be at the core of any momentum.
Dec 7, 2020: What are the business models for open bank...
Globally, open banking regulations have been introduced to widen competition and create new consumer choice. Other goals were also in place: Europe wanted to create a level of interoperability for European citizens that makes it easier for them to manage their banking across EU country borders.
Nov 30, 2020: Open Banking Credit Checks w/ Freedom Fin...
Credit scores are a way lenders price risk to borrowers. The issue is, historically the risk is tied to your credit cards and utility bills, which typically impact the most vulnerable of society more than any other segment.
Nov 23, 2020: Open Banking Enabled Payments
PIS essentially allows users to pay directly from their bank account — meaning TPPs can process payments to anyone with an approved bank account. Instead of complicating the customer conversion process with account creation and asking for bank details, PIS offers seamless integration with a network of regulated banks.
Nov 16, 2020: Open Banking Lending w/ OakBrook Finance
When open banking comes into play, lenders can use live financial transaction data gathered from someone’s bank account with their permission and enable brokers/lenders to speedily assess risk and affordability, thereby allowing them to issue loans responsibly.
Weekly Update November 8th, 2020
On top of tracking financial institutions providing open banking services, the OpenBankingTracker has also begun tracking TPPs and will look to broaden its coverage over time.