Consumers to benefit from open finance

MANILA – More Filipino consumers can benefit from a bid to make financial services accessible to everyone through an open finance framework.

“With open finance, Filipino consumers will be able to have a consolidated view of their personal data, and their financial transactions, access more affordable services that fit their needs, and ultimately make more informed financial choices,” Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Governor Benjamin Diokno said in a virtual briefing on Thursday.

He said the idea behind open finance is that customers are the owners of transaction data thus, “data should be shared if the customers wish to do so.”

Diokno said BSP has established the guidelines on open finance framework through Circular No. 1122, which is a major factor for digital transformation and financial inclusion.

“It promotes consent-driven data portability, interoperability, and collaborative partnerships among entities who adhere to the same standards of data security and privacy,” he added.

Under this framework, customers, as owners of transaction data, may opt-in and opt-out when they want to withdraw or change the scope of their consent.

Diokno said regulators are seeking the financial sector’s support in this bid, adding that participation in the open finance ecosystem is not mandatory.

“In establishing the open finance ecosystem, the BSP sees the value of placing the governance of the industry into a single body with explicit formalized self-governance structure where the industry standards and inter-participant business rules are housed,” he said.

An Open Finance Oversight Committee (OFOC) is now being formed and this will include representatives from each classification of banks, non-bank financial institutions, electronic money issuers, operators of payment systems, and other related sectors, he added.