What do fintechs think about PSD2 and open banking?

The new European Payment Services Directive (PSD2), adopted this month by the national law, will democratize the financial-banking services market, giving more players the chance to enter the competition, which will lead to lower prices, according to an online survey by iSense Solutions at the request of NOCASH, where 25 of the most relevant local fintechs contributed.

96% of the top managers questioned (CEO level) consider that the PSD2 directive is a beneficial tool, through which their activity becomes much more efficient, while 56% consider that PSD2 contributes to attracting new clients, which couldn’t be reached previously. A potential issue that can come up with the adoption of PSD2 is the fact that 22% believe that PSD2 will require additional capital in order to be implemented correctly.

Also, considering that open banking is a concept promoted towards the PSD2 directive, 87% of companies believe that open banking will lead to the democratization of the financial-banking services market and will give more players the chance to enter the market, thus leading to lower prices.

Moreover, 78% believe that banks will be more interested in fintech solutions as a result of developing the concept of open banking.

“Although PSD2 banking regulations represent an obligation that sets some minimum requirements for all players in the market, we see it as an opportunity that banks can use to develop new business models to interact with customers.

The idea of ​​Open Banking is in FintechOS DNA and is part of all the technologies we have developed. We will discuss at Banking 4.0 about the benefits of open banking and how we can help banks take advantage of this concept, but we will also address the prejudices regarding technology that “obstruct” the evolution of banks. “, Said Teodor Blidăruș, Co-Founder & CEO FintechOS.

“Financial services are based on the same basic concepts, decades old. FintechOS technology has the power to give a new perspective on digital transformation in the financial industry. It can innovate and bring rapid changes, proposing a different vision, meant to change the classical approach maintained only by the spirit of self-preservation of companies. We believe that fintechs have the opportunity to democratize and fundamentally change financial services as they have shown in the last 30-40 years. ”Added FintechOS representative.

The conclusions were obtained through an online questionnaire to which top managers of the most relevant local fintechs were invited to respond. The list of the fintechs which took part in the survey includes six areas of activity: payments & wallets, personal finance, financial infrastructure, lending & crowdfunding, investments & wealth management, enablers.

Participating companies: AlphaBlock, Allevo, Beez Software, Bewell Technologies, Druid, Finqware, Human Finance, iFactor, Instant Factoring IFN SA, Lendrise Marketplace, Maillon Fintech, Modex, Omnicredit, Oveit, Orbis Innovation SRL, Pago, Paybyface SRL, PitechPlus ( Younify), SelfPay, Starbyte, Symphopay SRL, Traderion, ThinkOut SRL, TypingDNA, Volt Finance.

About Banking 4.0

At the second edition, the international conference fintech Banking 4.0, is dedicated to emerging technologies that will change the banking industry in the following years: artificial intelligence, biometrics, blockchain, instant payments, machine learning, robotic process automation – RPA ), cloud & quantum computing.

Developed under the motto “compliance alone is a losing strategy”, the conference will enjoy the presence of over 200 experts/day from 20 countries, being one of the most important annual events in Romania in the field of fintech banking, with regional impact, through the presence of world-class experts.

The two days of this year’s event will be opened by Brett King on November 25th, and Chris Skinner on November 26th. Both are considered among the brightest minds in the field of financial technology, being authors of best sellers, consultants of the White House, in the fintech industry but also successful entrepreneurs. They are for the first time in Romania, in this formula.

About the New European Payment Services Directive (PSD2)

In essence, PSD2 obliges banks to make available to third-party players information which is authorized and supervised by the National Bank of Romania regarding the clients’ accounts, but only with their consent.

Thus, third-party players can provide clients with personal finance management services by aggregating bank accounts – all information to be centralized in one place, regardless of the number of banks the client owns an account with – but also the possibility to initiate payments and from other environments than those in which they were managing their financial operations, up to that moment.

Third-party players, that are required to hold a license issued by regulatory authorities, can access data held by banks through APIs (“Application Programming Interface”).

The normative act opens the way for the democratization of financial and payment services, which will be offered by new players, other than banks, and will lead to the emergence of new business models. The topic will be analyzed extensively at the fintech international conference – Banking 4.0

This is the case of the financial services marketplaces, a place where the client can find out in real-time if he is at the Credit Bureau, what credit score he has and which is the most suitable offer on the market for his profile. Once all these things are found, the credit is obtained 100% online, without having to go to the bank for signing.