The Financial Conduct Authority has set out its vision for Open Finance, aiming to give UK consumers and businesses greater control over their financial data across savings, borrowing, investments, pensions and insurance. The announcement arrives as open banking continues to mature and account-to-account payments keep gaining share, with newer mechanisms such as variable recurring payments already in circulation.
Sam Riordan, Executive Director, UK Banking & Payments at consultancy Capco, welcomed the move but said the regulator's plan will only deliver if the industry can agree on the underlying plumbing.
Today's announcement from the FCA, setting out its vision for Open Finance and giving consumers and businesses greater control over their financial data, is a very welcome move and an important signal that the agenda is moving from concept toward practical delivery. Building on the momentum created by CFIT's inaugural Open Finance Coalition and its 2024 Blueprint, which helped galvanise priority use cases and implementation considerations for the UK market, this could unlock a far more complete view of a consumer or business's financial position across savings, borrowing, investments, pensions and insurance, enabling more personalised propositions, better product suitability, more inclusive credit decisioning and stronger fraud prevention.
Riordan pointed to SME lending and mortgages as areas where portable, verified financial data could shorten decision times and sharpen underwriting. He also cautioned that "the scale of delivery should not be underestimated," arguing that success depends not only on the technical ability to expose and consume data through APIs, but on the industry aligning around common standards, consistent consent and permissioning models, clear governance and liability frameworks, and workable commercial incentives for both incumbents and new entrants.
Consumer trust, he added, is the gating factor. Open Finance will only scale if customers are confident their data is being shared securely, for a clear purpose, and in return for tangible benefits such as faster credit access or more suitable products.
The FCA's announcement lands at a point where the market has the ingredients for a broader data-sharing framework but still lacks the cross-industry coordination to ship one. The regulator's next move, particularly how it sequences standards work, governance and commercial incentives, will determine whether the vision becomes infrastructure or remains a consultation document.
