I am sure the panellists later will discuss these further when they talk about the future of banking. Let me turn to this forum’s theme question on whether we will witness an evolution or revolution in banking. I believe it will be both. A lot of attention and excitement have been created by services going digital. This digitisation of services have transformed the customer experience say for on-boarding or transactional purposes; but frankly, are not ground-breaking in themselves. As one commentary noted, this is no different from reading an actual newspaper or reading the news online. But a revolution is also happening when new digital services or business models emerge that employ say, artificial intelligence (AI) or blockchain technologies. These can fundamentally change how we borrow, save, pay, invest or insure. As an example, there is a UK bank BABB that leverages totally on blockchain and biometrics to provide peer-topeer financial services with the slogan of “everyone is a bank”. Time will determine the winners and losers as this cycle of technology disruption takes it course. Open banking Open Banking broadly captures the concept that a consumer owns information about himself, and should be able to share that information with any third party if he chooses, for example through APIs, and to transfer his money to any third party seamlessly. The effect is to give consumers ownership over their financial data, to make that data portable, and therefore enables switching and choice among financial service providers. This should promote competition to improve pricing and service quality.
The EU has started on this journey by making payment and data interconnectivity between banks and non-banks mandatory, through the Payment Services Directive 2. Australia has also announced that it will legislate a national Consumer Data Right in 2018, allowing consumers open access to all their data including banking-related ones. While these hold a lot of promise by promoting consumer interests and welfare, there are other details to consider. For example, what primary data rightfully belongs to the customer, and what about secondary data about the customer that a bank had made sense of? How should a customer’s data be packaged for onward sharing? How do we develop technical standards to share this information efficiently and securely? Who should pay for these? In Singapore, we subscribe to the notion of banks sharing their data openly as a larger good. Some of the operational details have to be worked out. In MAS’ engagement with the banking industry, there is broad consensus as to the benefits of open banking. What we see is an opening up of customer data as a ground-up process led by the banks themselves. We believe this is a constructive development, that industry players themselves see the value in doing so. Role of financial regulators In my remarks so far, it should be obvious that financial regulators will have active roles in the business and technology transformation in the banking industry. Regulators need to have a sharp understanding of emerging technologies and new business models, and to be alert to potential risks.