Commenting on the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement, Janine Hirt, CEO, Innovate Finance, said:

“Innovate Finance welcomes measures announced today by the Chancellor that will support the continuing success of the UK FinTech sector. Further announcements to progress the ambitions of the Mansion House Compact are a positive step to unlock additional investment for high-growth innovative companies here in the UK. The Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Venture Capital Trusts (VCT) being extended to 2035 is also something Innovate Finance has previously called for, and welcomes today.

“We support the government’s commitment to further unlock the growth of Open Banking and look forward to working with the government on these important developments, including building on Open Banking’s success towards a roadmap for Open Finance.

The Future of Payments Review by Joe Garner published alongside the Autumn Statement highlights the positive contribution the FinTech sector plays as part of the UK’s payment landscape, and it is a positive development that the Chancellor confirmed the government will be publishing a National Payments Vision next year. 

The Future of Payments Review also makes a number of observations relating to the issue of authorised push payment (APP) fraud. We support the findings that fraud prevention is critical, emphasising the need to tackle these scams where they originate, in particular social media platforms, and that the Payment Systems Regulator must formally review the costs and benefits of the new fraud and scam rules after 12 months of implementation. This is vital to ensure that while consumers are protected, the rules are both fair and proportionate for payment firms.

We also welcome the call for regulatory requirements applied to FinTechs to be clear and appropriate to reduce complexity for smaller firms which will increase their capacity to innovate.”

-ENDS-