So, you’re chairing The Flying Trapeze Stage today at Money 20/20?
We’re covering the whole thesis behind the Open Future. The logic behind it, of course, is that regulation is an essential part of it – PSD2, Open Banking, GDPR – but these were only necessary as regulatory levers because the big banks and other companies had ignored all of the other drivers to the Open Future. The big banks had ignored consumers attitudes, needs and expectations changing, they had ignored the technology that allows you to drive upwards consumers’ expectations, and they had ignored new competitors coming into the space.
Regulators had a number of concerns – that banks weren’t doing anything to meet the needs of their customers, they’ve got an oligopoly, they’re pretty much lazy, there’s no effort other than optimizing their big dumb product to push, and that the only thing they care about is acquisition, not so much customer retention, because you can just go and merge with the next big bank down the road.
So, countries around the world identified this 80/20 issue – that a small number of big banks, typically four, owned 80% of the customer base. This means there’s no innovation, no diversity of thought, and consumers get screwed.
The answer was clear – regulation, because it’s what banks are perfectly tuned to respond to. They are animals that respond – typically with anaphylactic shock – to compliance. They’ll lobby against it, of course, but ultimately, they’ll work hard to comply.