FinTech as a Force for Good: A British success story and how we unlock the next chapter of good growth
Today, Innovate Finance is launching FinTech as a Force for Good, setting out how the UK’s world-leading FinTech sector can do even more to deliver good growth, opportunity and better outcomes for people and businesses across Britain.
FinTech is already one of the UK’s great economic success stories and its contribution goes far beyond the growth of the sector itself.
The sector is showing how technology can be used to tackle everyday problems and deliver meaningful improvements in people’s lives. From helping first-time buyers access the housing market to giving small businesses access to finance, helping families find more affordable financial services and protecting consumers from fraud, FinTech is already making a positive difference in communities across the UK.
We have identified the actions needed to make sure the FinTech ecosystem can maximise the benefits of financial innovation for the wider economy, and maintain its world-leading FinTech hub status.
Read the Report Here
A national success story in numbers:
Our UK-based FinTech firms are international champions for British innovation, driving export revenues, harnessing the power of trusted AI, and making up over half of the UK’s ‘unicorn’ businesses. We have more FinTech unicorns (companies valued over $1bn) than any EU country and around four times as many as France or Germany.
While London remains one of the world's leading centres for financial innovation, the benefits of the UK’s 3,500 FinTech firms are felt in every part of the country:
- 68% of all SME lending in the UK is done by challenger banks and FinTechs.1
- In the North of England alone, FinTechs account for over 20,000 jobs.2
- Open Banking tools and services are used by 16 million individuals and SMEs a year, helping the nation to make informed financial decisions during a cost-of-living pressure.3
- In 2024, FinTech was the most significant source of jobs in the UK’s financial services sector.4
Our ability to start, grow and list FinTechs in the UK therefore has a direct impact on the productivity and resilience of Britain’s economy and communities.
FinTech as a natural partner for change
Around the world, governments are moving rapidly to embrace artificial intelligence, digital money, Smart Data and new forms of financial infrastructure. At the same time, British households and businesses continue to face significant pressures, from the cost of living and financial fraud to difficulties accessing finance and the challenge of growing in international markets.
Our report sets out six areas where partnership between Government, regulators and FinTechs could unlock significant innovation over the next two years, and enable the sector to do even more for British households and businesses.
| Policy area | Core recommendation | Key actions |
|---|---|---|
| Unlock trusted AI and Smart Data to help people and small firms reduce costs and manage their finances | Utilise Open Finance and Smart Data to make the UK the global leader in trusted AI-enabled financial services | • Bring forward the legal and regulatory basis for Open Finance for SMEs, savings, and financial advice by the end of 2026 |
| Protect people from fraud and ensure UK FinTechs don’t pick up the bill for fraud enabled by Tech platforms | Extend responsibility for payments fraud to the telecom companies and tech platforms where criminals target and build their scams | Amend the Online Safety Act to Introduce shared liability for tech platforms and telcos |
| Build a strong British Sterling Stablecoin ecosystem that reduces costs for SMEs and families, strengthens the £ and competitiveness of UK financial markets, and reduces the cost of Government borrowing | Adopt an ambitious national strategy to back the development of GB £ Sterling Stablecoins | Back British Stablecoins with:
• Reform of tax and accounting treatment |
| Accelerate adoption of digital verification in financial services, to tackle financial exclusion (including for homeless) and reduce fraud | Support the regulators and industry to build a trusted, reusable digital verification ecosystem for financial services with a vibrant market of innovative suppliers | Create a regulatory framework • Clarify liability • Promote open standards • Align with wider digital finance policy |
| Turbocharge UK FinTech exports in international markets | Develop FinTech trade and regulatory agreements with Commonwealth, US and EU and strengthen UK leadership in global standards | Prioritise Commonwealth, US and EU for regulatory recognition and live testing cross-border • Support UK leadership of standards setting for payments, tokenisation, Open Banking and AI |
| Build a strong ecosystem where more start-ups grow to unicorns; where scale-ups can compete with BigTech and Big Banks for workforce skills; more employees own shares in scale-ups; entrepreneurs reinvest in the UK; and people’s pensions invest in British companies. | Deliver the Mansion House accord objectives via the Pensions Roadmap. Tweak tax rules to incentivise employee share ownership, entrepreneur reinvestment and UK company listings (and combating hostile overseas takeovers). | Package of tax reforms that will generate increased growth and corporation tax and strengthen and protect British businesses and British jobs: • Reform share option schemes • Incentivise founder reinvestment • Abolish stamp duty on UK shares |
- British Business Bank, Small Business Finance Markets 2025/26, March 2026
- Whitecap Consulting, North of England FinTech Report 2025, August 2025
- Financial Conduct Authority, Open Banking: a year of progress, December 2025
- Boston Consulting Group & Innovate Finance, Accelerating the Unicorn Landscape in UK FinTech, April 2026
