FDATA submits 2025 pre-budget proposal to Canadian Finance Committee

Source: FDATA Global

The Financial Data and Technology Association (FDATA), a trade association representing more than 30 financial technology companies and consumer-permissioned data access platforms in Canada and the United States, has submitted to the Canadian House of Commons’ Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) its recommendations in advance of the 2025 budget.

The submission emphasized the need for the rapid and well-governed implementation of Canada’s Open Banking system and the expansion of Open Banking into an Open Finance framework to drive innovation and competition in the financial sector.

FDATA urges Canadian Government to implement Consumer-Driven Finance without delay

Seven years after the Government first committed to developing an Open Finance regime, Canada has made only limited progress. FDATA called on the Government to use Budget 2025 to rapidly implement a well-governed, interoperable, and regulatorily harmonized Consumer-Driven Finance system that empowers consumers and small businesses, boosts innovation, and enhances Canada’s global competitiveness.

Adopt critical structural reforms to ensure the regime works as intended

FDATA recommended a series of improvements to the initial framework launched under Budget 2024, including:

• Affirmatively including small business accounts in the scope of the first phase of implementation;
• Expanding participation to provincially regulated institutions to enable a truly national and competitive marketplace;
• Designating the Bank of Canada – not the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada – as the governing body to avoid fragmented oversight;
• Creating a tiered, harmonized accreditation model that supports fintech and start-up participation; and
• Clarifying enforcement processes and scaling penalties based on company size and violation severity, with clear appeal rights to avoid discouraging innovation.

FDATA also emphasized that regulatory harmonization across jurisdictions is essential to avoiding duplication and ensuring scalability. We called for amending the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act to establish a legally binding data access and sharing right for consumers and SMEs across financial, utility, and telecommunications sectors.

Further reading: FDATA recommends Canada’s Budget 2025 outlines Open Finance ‘vision’