The road to RegTech: the (astonishing) example of the European Union

Europe's road to RegTech has rested upon four apparently unrelated pillars: (1) extensive reporting requirements imposed after the Global Financial Crisis to control systemic risk and change in financial sector behaviour; (2) strict data protection rules reflecting European cultural concerns about data privacy and protection; (3) the facilitation of open banking to enhance competition in banking and particularly payments; and (4) a legislative framework for digital identification to further the European Single Market. The paper analyses these four pillars and suggests that together they are underpinning the development of a RegTech ecosystem in Europe and will continue to do so. We argue that the European Union's financial services and data protection regulatory reforms have unintentionally driven the use of regulatory technologies (RegTech) by intermediaries, supervisors and regulators, and provided an environment within which RegTech can flourish. The experiences of Europe in this process will provide insights for other societies in developing their own RegTech ecosystems in order to support more efficient, stable, inclusive financial systems.