Inside Brazil’s Open Finance: Who Owns Your Bank Data—and Who Profits?

Brazil built one of the world’s most ambitious open-finance systems, letting people share bank data across apps to get cheaper credit, tailored offers, and instant Pix payments.

It works only with explicit permission. Yet a quiet battle has erupted over what happens after consent is given—and who profits from it. At the center are payment initiation providers, or ITPs.

These licensed firms can trigger Pix transfers with a tap and, with customer permission, help aggregate account data. Some “pure” ITPs focus less on payments and more on turning data into services for retailers, betting platforms, or high-interest microlenders.

Banks say that once data flows to firms outside the Central Bank’s perimeter, transparency thins, consent becomes hard to manage, and fraud risks grow. They also complain about “bundled” permissions that pressure users to share data to complete a purchase.

Fintechs and open-finance advocates respond that the law is clear: the data belongs to the user, and use is allowed only with specific, time-bound consent under Brazil’s LGPD privacy rules.

Brazil’s Open Finance Expands Access Amid Governance Tightening

They argue the system is not a marketplace for raw data but a way to deliver services with user approval. The license itself is relatively accessible—ITPs launched with a minimum capital of R$1,000,000 ($188,679)—which helps new entrants compete with incumbents.

Scale is not in doubt. Brazil’s Open Finance has more than 110 million active data-sharing consents, and the model has already unlocked roughly R$30 billion ($5.66 billion) in credit by letting lenders analyze real transactions.

But the governance is being tightened. Industry proposals include simpler consent screens, a single dashboard where people can see and revoke every permission (similar to the Central Bank’s Registrato), and closing a reciprocity loophole that could let firms pull data without offering their own.

The story behind the story is a classic power struggle: incumbents fear disintermediation; newcomers see permissioned data as the great equalizer. For readers anywhere, the lesson is practical.

Open finance can cut costs and widen access—but only if consent is truly informed. In Brazil, that means checking the “My Sharing” area in your banking app and revoking any permission that no longer serves you.

More: Brazil news in English, every day from The Rio Times.

This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error