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Many PNC clients are having trouble connecting their bank accounts to their Venmo apps, cutting off their access to the popular mobile-payment system, owned by PayPal. When they have sought help, they have found the two companies blaming each other for the disruption. PNC suggested in tweets that customers switch to Zelle, a payment app that it and other big banks operate jointly and that competes with Venmo.
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EMVCo serves as a de facto standard-setting body in the card payments industry, and it is controlled by the MasterCard, Visa, American Express, Discover, JCB, and China UnionPay. This paper by the Retail Payments Global Consulting Group concludes that EMVCo standards have limited payment innovation, security, and competition, and impaired merchants’ rights to transaction routing choice.
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In many emerging economies, digital financial services markets are limited to one or two major providers, reducing innovation, customer choice and potentially facilitating monopolistic or cartelistic behavior. In this primer, CGAP proposes regulatory levers that policy makers can use to promote more competition.
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“Decades of consumer habit and resistance from retailers, say banking and fintech analysts, are proving hard to dislodge from a society that is used to paying in cash, enjoys the anonymity that comes with it and generally feels safe enough carrying around large sums. “
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The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority has today launched a Call for Input on the opportunities and risks arising from open finance, what is needed to ensure it develops in the best interests of consumers, and what role the FCA should play.
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Beginning in early 2020, HBAR holders that participated in the token sale will be able to take part in a program that would compensate them with annual allocations of additional coins. In exchange, investors would have to postpone the release date of the tokens acquired in their original investment.
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While the US still struggles to bring regulatory clarity to the world of cryptocurrencies, its neighbor, Canada, currently faces taxation issues. The country was quick to introduce crypto taxes as early as in 2013. However, the country’s CPAs are concerned that tax rules might scare away future entrepreneurs.
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Finland’s presidency of the Council and the European Parliament reached a political agreement on a new framework which makes it easier for crowdfunding platforms to provide their services across the EU. Following finalisation of technical work, the deal will be submitted for endorsement by EU ambassadors. The new rules will remove barriers for these platforms to operate cross-border by harmonising the minimum requirements when operating in their home market and other EU countries. They will also increase legal certainty through common investor protection rules.
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The Securities Commission of The Bahamas launched its FITLink Fintech Hub to serve as the central point of contact for the Commission’s engagement with the public on various issues related to FinTech, such as virtual assets business, crowdfunding, distributed ledger technology, artificial intelligence and virtual initial offerings.
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The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan has launched a regulatory sandbox to stimulate financial and technological innovation and help in enhancing financial inclusion and broaden the range of financial products in Pakistan.
