A coalition of U.S. crypto, fintech and retail groups is uniting to defend open banking, warning in a letter that big banks’ attempts to charge for data access could choke off the connections between the financial system and digital wallets and stablecoins.
Groups including the Blockchain Association, the Crypto Council for Innovation, the National Association of Convenience Stores and the National Retail Federation have written to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) asking the regulator to preserve key protections in its pending Rule 1033.
The rule would give consumers the right to freely share their financial data with third-party services, allowing them to connect bank accounts to crypto exchanges, stablecoin wallets and other fintech platforms.
The coalition said large banks are lobbying to narrow who qualifies as a consumer representative and to impose fees for data access. Those changes would entrench incumbents, weaken competition and cut crypto and digital wallets’ links to the U.S. banking system, the group said.
“A strong open banking rule is crucial to a competitive, flourishing, and innovative financial services ecosystem,” the letter reads. “Over the past decade, many of the financial innovations Americans use today were developed with the policy certainty that the United States was moving toward an open banking system.”
While banks say that open banking would add costs for them, the coalition argued that these costs — like cloud storage and technology infrastructure — are routine and expected for any modern bank around the world.
The coalition warned that weakening Rule 1033 could leave the U.S. lagging behind other major economies such as the U.K., Singapore and Brazil, where open banking frameworks are already standard.
“Strong open banking rules are what keep the U.S. competitive,” the group wrote, urging the CFPB to finalize Rule 1033 “without capitulating to the largest banks’ attempts to tax access to Americans’ own financial data.”