In this episode of the Connector Podcast, host Koen Vanderhoydonk interviews Philippe Depree, a partner at the Brussels‑based law firm Simon Brown and a fintech‑law specialist. Depree explains the emerging EU PSD3 and PSR legislative process, outlining the timeline from Commission draft (June 2024) through Council negotiations, Parliament adoption and the subsequent Level‑2 EBA technical standards expected by 2027‑28. He highlights that PSD3 is an evolution rather than a revolution, noting the disappearance of a separate e‑money institution category and the integration of e‑money services into payment institutions. The conversation then shifts to the broader scope of open banking under the proposed Financial Information Data Access (FIDA) framework, which would extend data sharing beyond payment accounts to savings, mortgages, credit, insurance, pensions and crypto assets, creating a new class of financial‑information‑data service providers. Depree discusses the upcoming regulation of Buy‑Now‑Pay‑Later (BNPL) providers, which will bring them under the EU consumer credit regime, imposing licensing, conduct‑of‑business rules and credit‑register interactions. He also comments on the EU MiCA crypto regime, noting Belgium’s particularly stringent marketing disclaimer requirements, and argues that while some regulations feel burdensome, they also generate opportunities for agile fintechs to build new services, especially through mandatory data sharing under FIDA. The episode concludes with Depree’s contact details (LinkedIn, website simonbrown.eu) and a reminder to follow the Connector podcast for future fintech updates.
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Welcome to the Connector Podcast, an ongoing conversation connecting fintechs, banks, and regulators worldwide. Join CEO and founder Coen van der Hooijdonk as you learn more about the latest available trends and solutions in the markets.
Welcome to another podcast episode, and today I'm here. with a lawyer. Philippe, who are you and who do you work for?
Thank you, Koen. So I'm Philippe Depree from Simon Brown. We're a Brussels-based law firm. I'm a partner there and a fintech lawyer. And since 2014, I'm part of their digital finance team. And we're doing all things legal, regulatory, and fintech. So we're there for Belgian clients, but we also specialize in welcoming foreign entities wishing to set up their business or rolling out their services in Belgium or in Europe through Belgium.
Through Belgium. So passporting.
Passporting, a lot of that, but also, you know, services that are not passportable and just, you know, under the local regime. So we do both. So a lot of regulator interaction, a lot of discussions with the regulator, looking sometimes for exemptions, advisory work in general. When, you know, new products are coming on the market, when they're disruptive, the regulator wants to know about it. before it hits the market. And, and also, yeah, the aftermath of audits sometimes, solving issues, uh, all that type of work basically.
So your, your shop is open for all these kind of questions?
Absolutely.
So talking about being open, I wanted to talk a bit about open banking.
Yes.
And, uh, a lot has been said around PSD2, but nowadays there is PSD3 coming up. So could you give us a little bit of insight? What is your view on that?
Sure. So PSD3 has made a lot of noise since the summer. The texts were released, the draft proposals were released by the Commission at the end of June. And since then, there is a lot of talk about these texts. But basically, this is just the beginning of a process. So the Commission has now come up with a proposal. And this fall, the member states will start to discuss on the level of the EU Council how they can find a compromise on these texts. And then only after that, we're taking it to the Parliament. So basically, we're looking for final text, level 1 final text, at the end of next year, more likely even the beginning of 2025 as a timeline. And the expectation is that a lot of what we have today in the proposals will change between now and the final text. And then we have also, as you know, in European regulation, a lot of level 2 regulations. So the EBA, the European Banking Authority, has received a very wide mandate To come up with guidance, regulatory technical standards, and when we will see the final text level two, it will be probably 2027, 2028. So it's the beginning of a process, but a very interesting process because now is also the moment that fintechs can in a way interact with that legislation because the member states are discussing this, and basically for the member states, the central banks, the supervisors are discussing or starting to discuss among themselves. Okay, how How can we find a compromise? And in Belgium, the National Bank of Belgium is typically opening up to the sector and saying, OK, please give us your input, either directly, individual institutions, or also through industry organizations like Fintech Belgium or also Pay Belgium, channeling all that input so that the NBB can take that on board and use it in the negotiation. So it's early process, but it's a very interesting timing for institutions that want to participate.
And can you already give us, although maybe things will change, but can you already give us a tip of the iceberg? What would be your top 2 things that are drastically changing in comparison to PSD2?
Well, in honesty, there isn't a lot of drastic change. If the question is, is this a revolution like PSD2 was, then our answer based on the current state of the text is definitely no. It's more of an evolution, it's more of an implementation of the lessons learned under, uh, under PSD2. One of the highlights, uh, is, is basically the, the disappearance of e-money institutions as a, as a separate category of, uh, of institutions. They, they will no longer exist, but it doesn't mean that e-money itself will disappear. So as of, as of the implementation of PSD3 and PSR, you will basically have, uh, payment institutions offering just payment services, and then those also offering e-money services.
Oh, interesting. Interesting. You still talk about money. PSD2 as such was somehow narrowed to cash.
Yes.
So what's happening in all the others? Because the crown jewels in banking not only lie within cash, but also with investment, pension saving. Well, you name it. There's so many other things.
Yeah. That's a good remark. Basically, PSD2 was the creation of open banking. And so there was a lot of, you know, a lot of celebration around that. But at the end of the day, if you look at the scope of open banking under PSD2, it's extremely narrow. It's just, as you said, you know, it's data on payment accounts. It doesn't even include saving accounts. Not even all accounts are included in this open banking. And the same day that the Commission released the PSD3 and PSR texts, it got a bit snowed under because everybody was, you know, talking about those texts. But the same day, they also released other proposals. And what we find typically interesting in connection to your question is the proposal on financial information data access. It's called FIDA.
Mm-hmm.
And it's, in a nutshell, basically open banking for all types of financial information. So beyond, you know, payment accounts, it includes savings, mortgages, credits, insurance, pensions, crypto assets. All of that information when, you know, when FIDA will, will come live one day, and as it looks today, will be part of, of open banking. So all of that information will be shareable.
Mm-hmm.
And so financial institutions will both be data holders but also data users. And there will be a new category of, of entities created, the financial information data service providers. And a bit like, you know, in under PSD2, with the account information service providers, this new entity will be able to build a lot of services around all of this financial information.
Will that also be an obligation by the financial institutions to share all that data that you just mentioned?
Yes. So in the same way as under PSD2 for the payment accounts, there is now also, of course, if the data subjects agree, so basically the clients of those financial institutions—
Consent.
Exactly, consent. It will be able, you know, the institutions will have to release that information. So typically, you bought a house, you got home insurance, let's say. And so 2 years later, you know, you want to change insurer. But, you know, you already went through a very painful process of having an expert, you know, taking pictures, filling out forms. And basically, 2 years later, you will be able to just, you know, notify your old insurer saying, can you please transfer all of that information to my new insurer so that he can already use that information? The same would go for MiFID questionnaires. As an investment service provider, you can simply say, okay, Well, I already filled that out. I already gave all that information. They have history on me. Just please pass it on to my new or additional service provider. Where today, those institutions have no incentive to share that type of information because a lot of clients will refrain from changing provider because they don't have to go through that type of process.
Yeah. And at the same time, there's no full harmonization either on that process at this moment.
Exactly.
probably will also be pushed in the next coming years. We're always looking forward now, maybe a bit more concrete. There has been the credit directive that has been adopted just recently with some interesting thoughts about buy now, pay later.
Yeah.
What's happening there, Philippe?
Well, for the moment, nothing, but we expect that things will happen in the coming 18 to 24 months. So we've all seen the rise of buy now, pay later providers.
Heavily.
Yes. So for those who are unfamiliar with this concept, it's basically allowing acquisitions to be made of goods, services through deferred payments. So you can pay something in 2, 3, typically 4 times. And from a regulatory perspective, and that's also a reason why they've grown so substantially over the last years, this is a very light regime. So basically, they fall completely outside the consumer credit regulation, while in essence—
It's doing the same thing.
Yes, it's credit. It's called payment, but it's credit in disguise. And so this has been criticized a lot by regulators, but also by the larger public opinion, because it's targeting a segment of the population that is already sometimes suffering from indebtedness. And so under this new— and that's not a proposal, that has been adopted, but it still needs to be implemented— These buy now pay later service providers will fully fall within the consumer credit regulation. So it means they need to be licensed, and they need to follow conduct of business rules. And the conduct of business rules—it's typically they have the obligation to provide a lot of pre-contractual information to their clients. They need to collect information, see whether you know this client is fit for credit or not, and they also need to interact with the credit register. All of that is is is not there today. It's basically a bit of a of a black zone in which those buy now pay later service. providers operate. And we do expect that this will lead to a lot of changes in the sector itself. Potentially, some of the smaller players won't be able to cope with this type of regulatory burden.
Mm-hmm.
And we'll see some, you know, some providers pulling out of the European market in general because a lot of them come from, you know, the US or Australia, and they might just decide to no longer be active on the European market. Or we will probably also see some consolidation. and a few institutions, you know, putting things together and continue as such. So it's something that, you know, I wouldn't say we're looking forward to it, but it's going to change the market of buy now, pay later significantly, for sure.
Depends which side of the coin you look at, right? If you look at the vulnerable people, then it also makes sense. Well, You're talking about almost like not something we look forward to, but at the same time, one of the topics of DFS is about regulations and regulations being an opportunity.
Yes.
What is your thought on that?
Yeah, I definitely think that regulation can be an opportunity. And in Europe, we don't have much of a choice. I mean, we have to see it as an opportunity because the cliché goes that in Europe we excel when it comes to regulation, and we regulate first and then we do business afterwards, unlike the US or Asia. So I think we should see it as regulation. For certain types of regulation, it's very difficult to identify the opportunity as a service provider. I'm making a jump now to, to the crypto industry where we've seen recently, beginning of this year—
MiCA.
In Belgium, MiCA is coming up, but there you can still, you know, identify an opportunity in a way that it will, you know, come to a single license and you get your license in one member state, you can passport it out. But what we've seen in Belgium, for example, with the marketing rules, where Belgium as one of the only jurisdictions in the world is now imposing the use of very aggressive disclaimers, like saying that the only guarantee in crypto is risk— that is something that needs to be published on all of the platforms when you focus or when you solicit Belgian consumers. But that's followed by a very long list of warnings of everything that potentially could go wrong when investing in crypto. I can imagine that for a crypto service provider, it's very hard to see, you know, the upside of that type of regulation, even though, you know, it's again about— certainly about justified consumer protection. But, you know, what we just discussed about FIDA, the Financial Information Data Access regulation proposal, there, it's clear that there is, you know, potential upside because we will be dealing with a unique framework in Europe where financial institutions are forced to open up, to share data, where, you know, normally they wouldn't have a real incentive to do that. And it's a unique situation. We don't see that in any other, you know, jurisdiction or geographical zone.
Not to that extent, right?
No, not— definitely not to that extent. And so this is, for me, Definitely something where, you know, smart, agile fintechs can buy— can build, sorry, a lot of additional and interesting services. So there it's for sure an opportunity.
Cool. Well, thank you very much for sharing. And time flies when you're having fun. So we are already at the end of our podcast. Maybe one more last question. Where can people find you? Apart from being at DFS, obviously.
Obviously, we'll be there with the whole team. So come see us. Very easy. You can connect on LinkedIn or you go to our website simonbron.eu and you can find all our information there. Perfect.
Philippe, many thanks for joining. Thank you also to the audience and stay tuned for more interesting news from fintech Belgium. Thank you very much. Thank you, Koen.
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