
Trading Tomorrow - Navigating Trends in Capital Markets
Welcome to the fascinating world of 'Trading Tomorrow - Navigating Trends in Capital Markets,' where finance, cutting-edge technology, and foresight intersect. In each episode, we embark on a journey to unravel the latest trends propelling the finance industry into the future. Join us as we dissect how technological advancements and market trends unite, shaping the strategies that businesses, investors, and financial experts rely on.
From the inner workings of AI and ML to the transformative power of blockchain technology, our host, James Jockle of Numerix, will guide you through captivating conversations with visionaries who are not only observing the future but actively shaping it.
Trading Tomorrow - Navigating Trends in Capital Markets
Open Banking and the Future of Financial Data in the UK
Open Banking Limited set the UK’s open banking standards, driving innovation and competition across retail banking. In this episode of Trading Tomorrow - Navigating Trends in Capital Markets, host Jim Jockle speaks with Nick Davey, their Head of Strategy, about how Open Banking Limited has developed, its successes for consumers and SMEs, and the barriers to scaling adoption. The discussion also covers the move toward open finance, the role of consumer trust, and what the future may hold as new use cases and data-sharing frameworks emerge.
Welcome to Trading Tomorrow Navigating Trends in Capital Markets the podcast where we deep dive into technologies reshaping the world of capital markets. I'm your host, jim Jockle, a veteran of the finance industry with a passion for the complexities of financial technologies and market trends. In each episode, we'll explore the cutting-edge trends, tools and strategies driving today's financial landscapes and paving the way for the future. With the finance industry at a pivotal point, influenced by groundbreaking innovations, it's more crucial than ever to understand how these technological advancements interact with market dynamics.
Speaker 1:Over the past decade, open banking has come from a concept to a reality, transforming how consumers and businesses move, manage and access their money. In the UK alone, adoption has surged to millions of users and billions of API calls each month, with open banking powering systems, lending and innovative new financial services. Now the conversation is shifting to open finance and beyond how financial data, from insurance to pensions to SME lending, can be securely shared to unlock even greater competition and consumer benefit. At the center of this evolution is Open Banking Limited, the implementation entity created by the CMA order. Obl built the UK's world-leading open banking standard and industry guidelines, which has driven competition, innovation and transparency across retail banking.
Speaker 1:To help us explore what's next in this space, we're joined by Nick Davey, head of strategy at OBL. Nick advises on a wide range of strategic initiatives, including the UK's national payment vision, smart data, sme lending and digital verification. He recently led OBL's policy work on commercial variable reoccurring payments and brings prior experience from the payment system regulator and the Bank of England. So, nick, thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks, jim, nice to speak to you.
Speaker 1:You know. So, to start, could you give us a snapshot of well how open banking is evolving in the UK from its early days and where we are now, and maybe even just start with what is open banking?
Speaker 2:What is, yeah, what is, open banking? I mean that's a good one to start with. It's sort of a global phenomenon, it's sort of racing its way around the globe. I mean, ultimately, uh, in the uk, open banking is the ability for individuals to get access to their current account, payment account data, uh, and use it with third parties to do cool stuff, basically, um, that's how it started. Very much on the data side, during that that journey that we've been on in the UK seven years now, payments also came along as well, and so that's sort of taken off in the UK quite a lot Payments to like merchants for goods and services, buying stuff, moving stuff around accounts. So that's also quite a big use case. But behind the scenes it's basically a set of APIs, application programming interfaces where fintechs can access banks and get data or initiate payments. That's pretty much what it is.
Speaker 1:So what would you say have been the biggest successes of the open banking phenomenon, from a consumer perspective as well as for SMEs?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know from a consumer perspective as well, as you know for smes, uh, yeah, I mean. So I mean technology's got a large part to play in all this. So you know, kind of going back a few years, it was pretty much you'd have to go into your bank, uh, or read a paper statement to figure out what you, you know where your financial position is, look about. You know what you've been spending. You know try to budget wasn't particularly great. Then you've got things like apps, kind of moving along. Banking apps. You could kind of log into one banking app and see where you are. Um, again, those have kind of evolved over time. They were quite basic, you know, a few years ago now, uh, with open banking, what you can do is like access all your accounts in an app so you can see all your accounts and where you, where you are, you can move money between them. You can do things like you know I've got more money than I thought I had in this current account at the end of the month I'm going to go and move that to a savings account. We can even automate that into a savings account so it does it automatically for you. You can go and you know, see sort of patterns, uh, and you can do like cool budgeting stuff as well.
Speaker 2:So on the data that's kind of it from the consumers you know. So unlocking that data to be able to do better decisions in terms of you know your spending, your investment, your savings. But also it's kind of given the ability for you to share that data with other financial intermediaries, so people who effectively loan you money. So you know if I wanted to go and get a loan, you know can I afford it or not? It's very simple for me to just agree to share my data with that bank or lender. And then they combine that using a third party program and within a few seconds say we think you can afford this, we've seen the patterns in your bank account. Here's a loan and that kind of also spills into the kind of SME space.
Speaker 2:So you know, if you're a small business and you want to get a business loan, that can be quite problematic, but now you've got the ability to share all your financial data with a lender and then they can take a decision pretty quickly. And traditionally you could only really go to your bank because they're the only people that had access to that data. But now you can unlock that because you can share the same data that your bank has with any provider so you can go to like you can get better beneficial rates. You can go to specialist types of lenders. You know, if you're in a particular sector and there's a particular sort of you know fintech bank who you know, you know lends in that sector, off you go, you can talk to them. So you've really kind of unlocked that ability to kind of get lending from different places and share that data.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, and that's that's just been pretty cool. But it's kind of the start of the journey, because we call this smart data in the uk and we're looking in the uk to um open this up to different sectors. So so, things like energy, buying a house, things like that, you know, in order to sort of automate it a lot better, um, and provide that kind of almost sort of seconds rather than days or weeks or whatever, in order to get the product, the service, um, and then obviously build new products and services on that. But, uh, we're starting the financial sector with open banking and yeah, so it's sort of seeing your financial products and getting loans is kind of the use cases we see mostly well, I'll definitely say it's come a long way, because you know I'm going to date myself here.
Speaker 1:But I do recall running to the bank before two o'clock on a Saturday with my passbook standing in line, because if I didn't get a withdrawal out I had no money to go out and hang out with my friends that night. You know, and god forbid, you know, you went on a friday and spent everything.
Speaker 2:You know you were in trouble yeah, yeah, I mean it's interesting because branches in the uk they've been generally closing over time because people have been moving on to internet banking, into apps and things like that. So you're seeing things like a real interesting evolution. So, as you say, years ago, when you'd have to go on a friday in order to, you know, to take out your money, we didn't really have saturday banking. Then we had a bit of saturday banking, as you say, until like 12 o'clock or two o'clock or something else like that. Um, we've had atms for quite a long time, but again, that kind of built up over time.
Speaker 2:Uh, and then you, you had banks coming into the uk who are offering like 24-hour you know branches or, uh, you know weekend banking and stuff like that and over, you know, because people are now using the kind of technology much more.
Speaker 2:It's gone back to their where there are branches, things like opening 10 to 4, like, rather than the 24-hour thing, because you can get access to your bank 24-hour either through telephone banking but through your app, through like chat lines and things like that. Um, so we've seen it go full circle and open banking is effectively embracing technology to do new things, uh, and unlocking data and and we'll see that in other financial services um, we, we do it. It's mostly done on payment accounts. It's it's based on individuals and smes at the moment, but I mean, I can see loads of use cases, cases for wholesale and stuff like that and different markets going forward, when you can actually access that data in an automated way and do really cool things with it to give you better lending decisions or, you know, move things quicker and safer. Yeah, yeah, it's a really interesting time.
Speaker 1:Well, with all positives, there's always some negatives. I'll start with one right? So anytime I go to a branch row, the only people who are in a branch are people with complex problems or large withdrawals or bank checks or whatnot. So the efficiency of the bank it's always. Oh God, I'm going to be here forever. So you know, in the old days there was like 30 people trying to take out their money. There was like 30 people trying to take out their money and now it's just like one person ahead of you, one teller, and you're standing there going. Oh God, you know, it's the one guy who needs 4000 quarters and we're going to be here for a while. But what are some of the bigger challenges or barriers in terms of scaling, in terms in the relation to open banking?
Speaker 2:Okay, well, it's not quite the same as is as waiting behind a guy for, like, lots of money and, uh, one teller who doesn't know what he's doing, necessarily, or you know. Um, no, the scaling side on open banking it's. So we've been on this journey for seven years, um, we currently have about 15 million users of open banking, which is about third of the uk population. It's taken a while to get there, so we see month-on-month growth very, very positive. But I mean the the scaling issue is really people sort of starting to see these things and accept it. I mean, again, I don't want to go back too far in history, but we were always told not to share information, like anything to do with your bank. Don't share your bank details because someone will steal all your money. Um, and we've moved beyond that to a kind of completely different world. And and with data, it's almost sort of like this data originally oh, this is the bank's data they're showing you. Then it's through history. It's like, well, no, this is your data. And then there's a whole wonderful world of whose data is it? But in europe and the uk very much, you know it's your data. Um, through to then not only is it your data. But you can share this with people you know app providers and fintechs and they'll give you something good in return for doing that. Um, sometimes it's free, sometimes you have to pay for it, but there are thick products and services and that kind of journey, um, you've seen people go on that journey over the last sort of seven plus years. You know um, and that's one of the issues kind of with scaling. It's it's sort of acceptance and understanding what the benefits are. Um, and and to be honest, it'd be great if we just did something on on day one. It's a big bang, but in financial services, never, never, anything seems to be a big bang. It's always kind of getting that user base, getting that acceptance.
Speaker 2:Um, I'm on the other side of it. I merchants have been relatively willing to accept this. Again, it's not widespread. You can't do it at point of sale in the UK, so it's online purchases. I mean, there are solutions to be able to at point of sale, you know in a shop or things like that, but it's not like an iPhone or you know an Android phone where you can just sort of tap. You know you have to sort of show a QR code, scan a QR code or authorize it. It's a bit more clunky, so those things haven't taken off.
Speaker 2:So again, scaling for other transactions, that's more on the payment side, something else that we will probably see coming in the next few years, but we're not there yet. So you know, in terms of payments, we're not the same as cards and and direct debits and things like that. And you know, in terms of payments, we're not the same as cards and direct debits and things like that. You know that we've been seeing going forwards. But yeah, I mean, scaling is still pretty good. There's a lot of acceptance now and we're seeing a lot of growth. But, yeah, seven years to get here. We have lots of fintechs in our ecosystem. We have 230-something fintechs. So actually the fintech investment side took off, I think, relatively quickly, and has been building. Again, it's quite a large market. I don't know what a sustainable market is for open banking. On the fintech side, we've seen a few providers go insolvent or consolidate and things like that. So it's still a kind of emerging market in that sense.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I mean, that is a wide swath of numbers. Do you see the consolidation trend going? You know, ultimately is there a space for three or four? I'm just trying to think of other sectors.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, bear in mind, we do both payments and data and we have some of the same operators in the uk that they're operating europe, in the us, we, we have these, these technical service providers, who provide like a network service. So they connect to lots and lots of apis, um, you know that there are, there are names, uh, I'm sure you're familiar with, um, uh, and so. So there are ways to, to to, you know, consolidate in the sense of, you know, if I was to launch a product tomorrow, I don't have to do everything. I can buy services that do part of it already and build it up. So that's difficult to know how that will go. But I mean, I don't know how many providers there will be in steady state in the future. I mean it's I can't pick a number, I wouldn't know.
Speaker 2:But you do see, some of them do specific things. So some are very large and they do like loads and loads of retail sales and and technical service provision. You can book a flight through them, you can. You know, with main airlines you can do this. And there are some that are very specific to a sector. So they'll do data to do with lending and credit scores, they'll do things to do with vulnerable consumers. They'll do more on the kind of app to show you you know what your balance is and help you move money between accounts which have got better interest.
Speaker 2:So you know there are different tranches as well of these providers. But I mean it's one of those ways you know they will come out, they will continue to evolve and innovate, but I suspect probably we're at a point where we've seen a couple of providers go insolvent more recently. You know it's going to be one of those things where I think we'll see more consolidation going forward, but I don't know which layer. I don't know if it's people folding into the TSPs or those that sit above it all consolidating together or sectors coming together.
Speaker 1:It could be any of those things. Now, you've recently worked on commercial variable reoccurring payments VRPs. So first of all, what is a VRP and why is this such a milestone?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, okay, that's a good one. So it's a great acronym that people in the industry actually hate, because you can't really explain it to anyone on the street. Yeah, here, go and get one of these commercial variable recurring payments, like it's not a product. So it's always one of those contentious acronyms. But the reason it's a milestone I'll explain what it is in a minute. Um, but the reason it's a master. I'll explain what it is in a minute.
Speaker 2:But the reason it's a milestone is because everything the uk up till now has been effectively mandated through either a competition order or through, uh, what is legislation? Um, laws in the uk that came from europe primarily, and so everything is free, and so the banks banks who provide the APIs at the moment don't get any money for it, and there was always, since the inception of open banking, a concept called premium APIs, and premium means that you pay for them. So it's not something that's been mandated or acquired by legislation or by government or regulators. It's something where the banks come along and say we'll provide this to you, but we'll provide it for a fee, and we know you want this and you're going to go and do something with it to sell it in order to pay for that. So that's the commercial element of it. It's the first time that we're having like pay per use APIs. What it is is it's like a card on file type payment or a direct debit payment, so you set up a payment relationship with a payee. When we're going live at the moment we're going live with a limited set of people you can actually pay as a kind of pilot and then it'll be expanded to much more sort of e-commerce type environments is to much more sort of e-commerce type environments.
Speaker 2:But what it does is says I want to allow payments to this provider. Let's say it's a utility company. So my electricity provider I'm quite happy anytime it has a bill, that it can just tell me what the bill is and my bank will pay it on my behalf. Effectively it's called variable recurring payment. The reason it's variable is it might not be the same every month or every week or every quarter or whenever that kind of comes in. But when I set it up I set it up with parameters. So I say I'm quite happy to make a payment on my account, but as long as it's between zero and 50 pounds, 100 pounds whatever, and so when that payment comes in. If it's outside of that, it's a really high number or whatever. That won't be allowed. So I've still got control over that because in in card on file payments and direct debits in the uk, you don't have that level of control.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, the payment just sort of effectively goes out and then you suddenly say what, how much have I spent? So it kind of gives you that, that additional level of control and you can set some conditions around it as well. But then it effectively starts doing that automation of payments on your behalf. Direct debits are typically more like utility payments and things like that, but a card on file, where you're on a big american online store buying things, effectively you just press go and you want that payment to go and you want to get the product again.
Speaker 2:You, you have an arrangement with the big online us store that says I'm quite happy to make payments anytime I click the button up to 50 pounds, 100 pounds, whatever it is and every time you click it the money just gets pushed from your account to their account. Um, and unlike card schemes, uh, typically that money will move uh almost instantaneously and into their account, whereas in card schemes there's a couple of days, usually or so, before you get the money. So merchants kind of benefit from that and with less intermediaries it's it's theoretically going to be cheaper as well. I mean that that's tbc, but the idea is that it will be better for merchants because it'll be cheaper, more efficient, efficient and I'll get the money immediately.
Speaker 1:Interesting and with the EU progressing the financial data access framework, how do you see the UK and the EU approaches converging or diverging, as both are moving towards open finance?
Speaker 2:Ah, yeah, so, yeah, so, yeah. So open finance is kind of it's one of those things that's been talked about on our domestically since about a year after open banking started. I remember going to conferences and people started talking about this thing called open finance. We tend to mean it domestically to mean more accounts, so savings accounts, looking into investments. You've got things like pensions, but we've got something called the pensions dashboard in the uk, um, which is a project that's been been going for many years and you it's different financial products, insurance, etc.
Speaker 2:I know that the european list is massive in comparison to what we've been considering. I know that they they did start with a long list. I think feeder is now in trilog um, we're in in in the eu, which means it's the kind of final stages before they agree it uh, then it gets enacted and then there's usually a period of time that everyone can become compliant with it. I don't know what those timelines are because we're not in europe and um, it's only sort of speculation, but we believe that's going to happen towards the end of this year, with uh delivery by 2027 um. In terms of uh overlap, I think. I mean we've got open standards, so what we do in open banking is we provide the standards that the apis are, how you interact with those apis, what the trust framework is, um, which is you know how do you tell the bank that you're, that I've given permission for my data to be shared, and things like that. Those things typically are more held domestically, so I don't think they're going to necessarily harmonize across uk and europe, but there's already studies ongoing about how data can be shared across them, how standards are similar and how, say, if I was to go to Europe and I wanted to get a bank account, how I could use my data from the UK to prove credentials in order to get the account in the EU and vice versa, and things like that. Those studies are ongoing and I think for open, open finance, those things will will continue as well.
Speaker 2:Where, um, I'm not sure the standards will necessarily be the same, but they'll they'll be similar standards and that you can interpret them in the same, similar way to in order for that data to be shared across border, um, uh, and I suspect it will end up being the same sectors, but I think the way we're going to get there will be different. I think in europe it's very much a? Um, this is what the law says you have to do now. Go away and do it and if not, um, there'll be trouble, there'll be consequences.
Speaker 2:Uh, in the uk we we've passed something called the data act, uh, which will, uh it gives our our um, our treasury, uh, the ability to uh put the fca, our financial conduct authority, like financial regulator, give them powers to start, you know, requiring things to happen. So it's not the same as like legislation, and it's up to them to choose what sectors and how to do it. They're likely to come out around the end of Q1 next year with a roadmap for open finance is going to look like. Clearly, by then the feeder stuff will have worked through, so they will have the visibility of Q1 next year with a roadmap for what open finance is going to look like. Clearly, by then the feeder stuff will have worked through, so they will have the visibility of Europe and it's up to them as to how much they want to have convergence or not with that roadmap. But open banking is ready to start implementing open finance as soon as that roadmap has been published effectively.
Speaker 1:Well, with any technology, there's always an element of trust. This is a huge conversation, especially around AI, but how important is consumer trust in this transition and what needs to be done to ensure people feel comfortable sharing more of their financial data? And I'm assuming there's probably age gaps and things like that as well?
Speaker 2:I mean I haven't done the studies on this. I mean there are demographics about. You know who is more so. Generally, younger people interact better with technology. When I say better, that in terms of they're more open to technology and changes, they don't have any legacy issues with those things and, unlike you and me, they've probably never gone to a bank branch and waited for ever for doing stuff. So you know it's that sort of thing. But we've also find that there's quite a lot of what we call, I think, what industry calls silver surfers, older people who've also engaged with technology. There's this kind of tranche in the middle.
Speaker 2:I think people are more willing to share data these days. Social media has kind of shown that people do, if they get a benefit from it, will share, share data or you know experiences with them. I also find that there's, you know, every so often there's a sort of a blip when something happens, data gets leaked or um, then you know there's been a a big problem related related to data or some sort of scandal. But generally people are sort of buoyant, but they'll only do it if they see a benefit from it, right, so if there's an app that says, oh, share all your financial data and then you absolutely do not receive any benefit from it. They're not going to do it. So what's the purpose of Open Finance? Well, you can see all your financial positions. Insurance isn't all in one place. Okay, that's quite helpful. I know I'm insured and how much I'm spending each month gives me more budgeting tools. If I can then use that data to go hang on, is this insurance right for me? You, you know, because from other aspects of what I'm you can see, is there a mismatch and and they say, yeah, absolutely, you are completely overinsured or you've insured yourself with the most expensive insurer for things that you don't have anymore and things like that. You can get some financial benefit. Then people will start kind of buying into that um, and I think that's a really, really interesting area of development.
Speaker 2:Um, but this also plays into the sequence that you kind of deliver open finance. Because if you, if you do it in what do I mean by that? I mean, um, like, if you do very, very disparate, different sectors as you go along, different products which don't fit together particularly well, you're not going to get that holistic view of your um, your situation, your finances, and you might not kind of get that benefit from being able to go and get a better deal somewhere. So I think you need to make sure that when you deliver open finance, you deliver it in a holistic way, that kind of builds on itself, and not just you know I'm going to do insurance today. Oh, tomorrow I'm going to do something completely different. It doesn't kind of fit in that kind of continuum. Um, yeah, yeah, it's, it's going to be interesting. Uh, open finance, because I mean, some people open banking think of it as a continuum of open banking, because we started off with current accounts but we never did savings accounts because that wasn't part of the remedy. Um, and then, uh, some people have done credit card accounts, but it's not universal, so you'd want to see your credit card account. And when you kind of build all up that kind of position, it seems like it's the whole of your sort of finances which, to some people, they think of as open banking. We've kind of defined open banking quite specifically to sort of current accounts and payment accounts in the UK. But yeah, I think that's going to be really, really interesting.
Speaker 2:And when you build that into smart data, so like energy data, for example, um and uh, I mean we've got ones about when you other sectors as well. But there's things like um, you know, can you get a lower energy bill? How? How much data do you need to actually answer that question? Well, if an app can go, how much do I spend on my energy bill? What's my energy usage? How big's my house? Because they can go and look, uh on the electoral register to say how big is my house and where is it, and things like that. Um, then look at energy usage and and and uh, look at, say, um, uh, forecast for the weather and then say things like did you know that you could put solar panels on your roof? Or did you know that you haven't got um as much um insulation as you could? So it's not just I could go to a different provider, but I could do something different in order to lower my bills or to get a better experience. Those things kind of build um, which I think is quite interesting as well. So I think financial data now is very, very significant, but you build loads of different data sets together in an automated way and you can start answering loads of questions.
Speaker 2:And that's for consumers, but businesses as well. You know they spend a lot of money on energy and offices and premises. I'm sure you guys do. Um, you know, can I get a better supply chain? I've got all this data. I you know. I'll give it to a supplier. They say, absolutely, you know, we'll automate automatically turn off your lights at five o'clock. There's no one ever works in your office on a friday. Let's not put heating on those things. I know they're very simple things. Um, uh, you know, but, and this can save you that much money and then that can be reinvested in in, uh, more staff or a different product development, or, you know, more R and D or something else like that. That, I think, is really quite exciting.
Speaker 1:So, beyond consumers, how will open finance shape the competitive landscape for banks or FinTech and, you know, potentially other players that we're not even thinking about right now? Wow, yeah.
Speaker 2:So I think that what we have focused on quite a lot in open banking is consumers, who are the data subjects, that's, their data and what they're going to do with it.
Speaker 2:But there are opportunities, as we've seen in terms of lending, for banks to make better credit decisions based on having data and other banks being able to enter the market. As soon as you open up more financial data, I think there is the opportunity for banks to have a different and possibly better relationship with their customers. They can make recommendations. If you trust them, you say look, here's all my data. What do you think? They can go away and say, okay, they might not sell insurance, they might not have a market insurance, but they might say, generally, we think this would be better for you and we think this would work, and they can have that kind of closer interaction, which I think is a good thing. I think, also, they can take that data uh, I was going to start talking about digital identities, which is a a wonderful subject, uh, in the uk, but you can start taking that data and building that into into more of a digital pattern a bit. You know, a digital identity for that, that individual, which you can use for other other uses outside of the banking system, but you can monetize it. People generally want to pay for verification. You know, I want to be sure this person's over 18. I want to be sure this person is the person they say they are. They will pay for that, um, and so you can monetize that as well, and that's giving a service to your customer as well. So it's not something that you know it's behind their back, that's something they would want, because then they get to you know, um, buy alcohol because they're old enough or or whatever. So I think there's lots of opportunities for banks.
Speaker 2:Um, I just think that some banks need to get out the mindset of it's on my data and it's my customer and this is the thing I do with them and think about embracing data more and that relationship with their customer and what they can do with it. Um, I mean saying that I'm sure some banks are very much in that, that sort of spirit and thinking about those things. But maybe you know, thinking about not just I'm giving up this data to these fintechs who are just going to take it, exploit it and do things with my customer and take money off me. And think about it as what is the better relationship I can have by utilizing this data? I can have by utilizing this data.
Speaker 2:You know, and it might well be that I'm a bank and I've got a customer and, um, I have a relationship with them, but I, you know, I'm suggesting to them they share other banking details with me in order for me to say things which you know, honestly, saying things like I can offer you better things, but maybe I can't offer you better things, but here are, things are going to help you, and then that customer will trust that bank and there'll be a, you know, a longevity in terms of relationship, um, which, and and then obviously, they'll hold savings, they'll take loans, yeah, which does, which does go into monetization, but yeah, yeah, I think those things will be really, really cool.
Speaker 1:The the challenge is, you know, I go back to 10 years and you make me think about you know, uh, in terms of data and I think it was like all over linkedin and, like you know, the phrase was data is the new oil.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah so trying to get people to give up their oil? Uh, I don't know. Visit texas, I see how that works out. Unfortunately, we made it to the final question of the podcast. We call it the trend drop. It's like a desert island question. So if you could only watch or track one trend in open banking and financial data access over the next few years, what would it be?
Speaker 2:One trend? That's a really good question. It's a difficult one, but I think I mean, obviously we always track how many people use it, but what the use cases are and how innovative people are coming with the data is the one thing I think that I would track over time, because people are coming up with new and good use cases all the time, but there's always something that comes out to surprise you, and how that's building over time is the thing I think I'm going to track, and that typically is the fintech sector, but that could come out of any bank or financial institution, and I'd be really happy to be surprised by an incumbent bank doing something incredibly strange as much as a fintech.
Speaker 1:Well, nick, thank you so much for your insights. It's a fascinating topic and one that affects everyone on a daily level, so thank you so much for your time today.
Speaker 2:No problem, jim, nice to speak to you.
Speaker 1:Thanks so much for listening to today's episode and if you're enjoying Trading Tomorrow, navigating trends in capital markets, be sure to like, subscribe and share, and we'll see you next time.