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Open Banking and Payments Competition

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Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#51

Post by marcus_holmes »

politician wrote: post #9
zaptheimpaler wrote: post #7

I just want to easily pull bank/card transactions into my budget app, and the glacial pace of open banking really annoys me. The pace in Canada has been just as slow, although we have Interac for direct person to person transfers already so I'm not sure how much the issue of direct payments applies there. It's really just f**ing ridiculous that some of the earliest and most important digital systems we have are allow…

> Banks suck so goddamn hard and are allowed to operate without any real competition and don't innovate at all. It's not really the banks' fault. They're all stuck leasing expensive information systems from entrenched third-party technology shops. They don't have software development dollars and they are extremely risk averse, to a paranoid degree. Thank the regulatory environment for that (state and federal). Compan…

This is not the problem. If it was the problem then banks in (most of) the rest of the world would also be stuck 50 years in the past. They're not.

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#53

Post by erinnh »

rkomorn wrote: post #44
AndrewDucker wrote: post #43

No mention of how open banking works outside of the US, where (in the UK) bank transfers are basically instantaneous and free, and I can happily retrieve my payments list to my budgeting app.

> and I can happily retrieve my payments list to my budgeting app Is this a UK thing? I've been searching for something like Mint/Quicken in the EU and haven't found anything worthwhile because there doesn't seem to be a standard for budgeting apps to connect to banks.

PSD2 is that standard.

I personally use Finanzguru (for the German market, it supports many banks).

Likely to be many others.

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#54

Post by AndrewDucker »

rkomorn wrote: post #44
AndrewDucker wrote: post #43

No mention of how open banking works outside of the US, where (in the UK) bank transfers are basically instantaneous and free, and I can happily retrieve my payments list to my budgeting app.

> and I can happily retrieve my payments list to my budgeting app Is this a UK thing? I've been searching for something like Mint/Quicken in the EU and haven't found anything worthwhile because there doesn't seem to be a standard for budgeting apps to connect to banks.

A quick search shows this one is well regarded https://www.bilanceapp.com/

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#55

Post by gethly »

elric wrote: post #33
gethly wrote: post #30

The entire banking industry is the most backwards, outdated and barely functioning sector in the whole world. I have no clue how we have not yet collapsed the financial system via some hack or basic data loss.

> I have no clue how we have not yet collapsed the financial system via some hack or basic data loss. Banks are pretty good at not losing data. They're also pretty good at layered security. I mean there's fraud and theft on all levels, but collapse-level events don't come from "a hack or basic data loss". They come from political incompetence and large scale economic events.

> I mean there's fraud and theft on all levels

you are confusing payment card issuers and processors with banks

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#56

Post by gethly »

sunaookami wrote: post #45
gethly wrote: post #30

The entire banking industry is the most backwards, outdated and barely functioning sector in the whole world. I have no clue how we have not yet collapsed the financial system via some hack or basic data loss.

As someone working in fintech (in Europe): I agree. People always say "well at least it's tested and works!" but fintech is pure bullshittery. We wrap shiny new apps over 30 year old legacy systems written in C++ and bank employees need to constantly correct data manually. I know from a bank that has only one employee that knows about the whole system and nobody knows what happens when they retire (is already aged >5…

Oh man, so true. Don't even get me started on the red tape in EU.

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#57

Post by eadmund »

EGreg wrote: post #5
theendisney wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a funny chat in the 90s with soneone in charge of a bank. The thing was, they wanted me to supply a business plan. I know how to write those but find it mysterious that they want me to write it for all completely unorriginal businesses. If one wants to start a shoe store one should simply investigate the demography and map the varous shoe stores nearby. The bank is in a position to do that cheaply for their ent…

Well of course. That’s how most gatekeepers act. Why does every employee in the US need to pay an accountant to file their corporate payroll taxes, when the corporation knows how much they paid and can just use THEIR accountant to report this same information? It would be standard across many employees. And in Europe that’s largely what’s done. But in USA this creates many “bullshit jobs”. The IRS just closed their f…

> Why does every employee in the US need to pay an accountant to file their corporate payroll taxes, when the corporation knows how much they paid and can just use THEIR accountant to report this same information?

How would my employer know how much money my savings, chequing and investment accounts make? I owe taxes on all of those as well as on my income.

How would my employer know what interest I pay on my mortgage, how much I contribute to charity and my other deductible expenses?

> some states have NO WAY for you to file taxes without an accountant

Which ones?

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#58

Post by astrange »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #51
politician wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Banks suck so goddamn hard and are allowed to operate without any real competition and don't innovate at all. It's not really the banks' fault. They're all stuck leasing expensive information systems from entrenched third-party technology shops. They don't have software development dollars and they are extremely risk averse, to a paranoid degree. Thank the regulatory environment for that (state and federal). Compan…

This is not the problem. If it was the problem then banks in (most of) the rest of the world would also be stuck 50 years in the past. They're not.

Other countries' banks don't have the US regulatory environment.

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#59

Post by dahcryn »

elric wrote: post #32
zaptheimpaler wrote: post #7

I just want to easily pull bank/card transactions into my budget app, and the glacial pace of open banking really annoys me. The pace in Canada has been just as slow, although we have Interac for direct person to person transfers already so I'm not sure how much the issue of direct payments applies there. It's really just f**ing ridiculous that some of the earliest and most important digital systems we have are allow…

> allowed to wall in their data with no API access There's PSD2 in the EU (or Eurozone? Not sure actually). Basically forces banks to open common APIs to encourage interopability and competition. However, it's not aimed at users but rather at companies in fintech building applications. Some banks (Bunq comes to mind) offer APIs to their customers for direct use, but most don't. The reason is obviously security. Peopl…

It's a great idea, but it's been killed off by the small print that was lobbied into the requirements

Basically, banks force apps or users to require you fully revalidate user consent every 90 days. And it's quite an annoying process. That means any app or integration you want to build, requires 10 minutes of your time every 90 days or they stop working. It's killed many Fintech's.

It all works on paper, but is drafted into law by politicians who have no clue about technical challenges and user experience. So in the end, it works exactly as designed by the banks: it doesn't

Re: Open Banking and Payments Competition

#60

Post by CamouflagedKiwi »

toenail wrote: post #23
tossandthrow wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does it mean that you are your won bank? Do you treat your matrass like a bank? Maybe with the pidgin carrier protocol to do money transfers?

I use a decentralized global ledger and can make instantaneous peer to peer payments to anyone on the planet. I'm not just my own bank, I participate in a system that replaces central banks and provides a money that isn't constantly devalued. It's called bitcoin.

Being able to send a commodity to other people is not what people or regulators mean when they talk about something being a bank.
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