Fintechs Canada has urged Ottawa to make competition and innovation in financial services a central focus of the upcoming review of the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement (CUSMA), arguing that modernizing Canada’s domestic financial sector is critical to its credibility as a trading partner.
“A strong and innovative financial sector is the backbone of North American trade and economic growth,”said Fintechs Canada’s executive director, Adriana Vega, in the letter. “When money and data move seamlessly through trusted networks, businesses gain access to new markets, investors deploy capital with confidence, and exporters can better manage currency and supply chain risks.”
Fintechs Canada is the national voice of the country’s leading financial technology companies. Its members include market-leading Canadian fintechs, technology providers serving credit unions, fintech-friendly financial institutions, and global firms operating in Canada. Collectively, they serve millions of Canadians every day. The organization’s mission is to make Canada’s financial system more competitive and innovative while preserving its integrity, stability, and security.
The association’s submission outlines three priorities for the review.
First, it urges Ottawa to strengthen domestic competitiveness through reforms such as open banking, competition mandates for financial regulators, fair access to payment systems like the delayed Real-Time Rail, and a clear framework for stablecoins.
Second, it calls for closer regulatory alignment among the three CUSMA partners to reduce friction and promote innovation. The group recommends reactivating cross-border coordination bodies like the Committee on Financial Services, which has been dormant since early in the agreement’s life. Aligning policies on open banking, tokenization, and data portability, it said, would help position North America as a global hub for financial technology.
Finally, the group urged Canada to defend the free flow of financial data across borders, warning that localization rules could fragment systems, increase fraud risks, and raise costs. It recommends clarifying the scope of CUSMA’s public-policy exceptions and explicitly prohibiting measures that create data barriers in financial services.
Fintechs Canada’s submission frames these priorities as both a domestic economic imperative and a regional strategy. “For Canada to remain a strong and credible partner under CUSMA,” the group writes, “it must pair its commitment to trilateral cooperation with a renewed focus on competition at home.”
To read the full submission, click here.
