Wealthsimple among first financial institutions to bring Canada’s Real-Time Rail to market

Source: Wealthsimple

Wealthsimple, Canada’s leading financial innovator, today announced it’s one of the first financial institutions to join Canada’s Real-Time Rail (RTR), a new national payments system developed and operated by Payments Canada. The RTR will bring faster, more seamless payments to Canadians. Of the participants joining the system at launch, Wealthsimple has the largest Canadian market share.

As an early adopter, Wealthsimple clients will be among the first Canadians to experience instant money movement between institutions through the RTR. The new system will enable Canadians and businesses to send and receive payments in seconds, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, including holidays, marking a major step forward in modernizing Canada’s financial infrastructure. The company is currently testing capabilities, with plans to roll out new instant payment features in 2027.

“When Canada embraces new technology, innovation and competition follow, and consumers benefit. Canadians deserve instant, seamless, low-cost financial products to power their businesses and their lives,” said Mike Katchen, chief executive officer and co-founder of Wealthsimple.

“The Real-Time Rail can transform how money moves in this country, with payments that arrive in seconds instead of days. We’re proud to be among the first institutions to join the RTR and bring this technology to the millions of Canadians who trust us with their money.”

The C.D. Howe Institute projects that, with its functionalities at launch, the RTR will generate up to $14.5 billion in cost savings from lower processing costs, reduced use of cash and cheques, and reduced float (the period during which funds are temporarily unavailable to the recipient). Extending beyond these cost savings, the RTR is expected to generate $16 billion in economic gains, growing to $27 billion as new functionalities are introduced over time.

“On behalf of Payments Canada, I want to thank Wealthsimple for their role in bringing our country’s real-time payment rail to fruition,” says Donna Kinoshita, chief payments officer at Payments Canada.

“Participation will provide their customers with access to instant payments, robust fraud mitigation and data-rich capabilities that will unlock new payment options and use cases for Canadians and their businesses. The launch of the Real-Time Rail marks the start line for how the industry collectively transforms payments across Canada. Today, we celebrate this important milestone and look forward to shaping the future of Canadian commerce together.”

For Canadians, the RTR means faster access to their money and greater flexibility in managing everyday finances. Today, one in four Canadians 18 to 40 years old uses Wealthsimple to manage their money across investing, saving, spending, tax filing and more. For the 30,000 Canadian businesses Wealthsimple serves today, faster payments can improve cash flow by reducing the time spent waiting for funds to arrive.

Wealthsimple’s participation at launch builds on years of work to modernize Canada’s payments infrastructure. In 2022, it became one of the first securities dealers to join Payments Canada and the first non-bank, non-credit union to be granted a settlement account at the Bank of Canada, giving it direct access to the RTR without relying on a bank as an intermediary. Wealthsimple was also the first securities dealer to join Interac e-Transfer® and the first Canadian fintech to achieve SWIFT membership, making it only the second non-bank fintech in the world to do so.

These milestones reflect Wealthsimple’s commitment to improving financial services for Canadians, while helping to shape the future of Canada’s financial system.

Further reading: Bank of Canada sets out accreditation requirements for Consumer-Driven Banking participants