Bank Vs. Fintech: BCRA requires entities to remove limits on transferring money in virtual wallets

The Central Bank required entities to remove some barriers so that bank accounts could receive transfers from virtual accounts. This was done through a note addressed to the banking associations to inform each institution that They should freely allow interoperability between accounts with CBU (located in banks) and accounts with CVU (belonging to fintech or virtual wallets).

BCRA’s announcement responds to frequent complaints from fintech companies that many local banks face some hurdles when their customers want to transfer money to virtual accounts.

Many entities do not allow more than $50,000 to be transferred electronically in a day, despite the fact that the criterion does not establish limits., others added an extra step to the operation to discourage it, or Take 24 hours to deposit money Instead of doing it immediately, as technology allows. All these constraints are prohibited by the monetary unit, which in June 2019 provides that ,Fund transfers linked to CVU should be able to be done under the same conditions as instant transfer between Uniform Bank Keys (CBUs).,,

Several representatives of leading banks sat down with their fintech counterparts to seal an agreement that would improve fraud prevention and eliminate the draft limit between CBUs and CVUs.

The conflict between banks and fintechs at this point escalated last July, when Association of Banks of Argentina (ABA), which brings together private entities with foreign capital, and Argentine Banks Association (Adeba), which holds the national capital’s clusters together He sent a joint letter to the central bank demanding more rules for fintech. He also requested that each bank should be able to fix a limit amount for transfer for each customer., according to your risk profile.

In the note, curiously, the banks admitted that they were setting transfer limits in CVU accounts., notwithstanding that it is not permitted by the rules of BCRA. your reasoning? High level of fraud was carried out through virtual accounts.

From Argentine Chamber of Fintech He expressed himself on the subject via Twitter: “very good news That the Central Bank needs to resolve irregularities in transfers from banks to CVUs. This is a repeated claim of our Chamber and the entire fintech ecosystem and A necessary condition for achieving effective interactivity, without arbitrary limits on quantity or conditions, and under the same conditions”.

official word

According to the note sent on Thursday 16, which he accessed infobae, the Central Bank emphasized three points:

, Cannot have “allocation of limit on amount” For transfer from CBU to CVU. According to the rules, it can be transferred immediately “without the need for special requests” up to an amount equivalent to 15,000 UVA, which is equivalent to $1,257,000 today. ,This regulatory requirement applies to both transfers involving CBUs and CVUs, ambiguously.,

, Transfer to fintech accounts must be enabled across all electronic channels regardless of who owns the account or the type of entity it is based on. “This functionality must be available in all financial institutions in accordance with the Regulations on the National Payment System”; You

– can not be “A differentiated interface” For these transfers, as already stated, instead of providing the service “under similar circumstances”.

The Central Bank has warned all banking institutions that There “Abuse in the application of the conditionality allows the suspension of recognition temporarily of immediate transfer, The norm allows a delay in recognition for security reasons, but many entities, the BCRA considers, take advantage of this as a mechanism to delay the transfer of funds.

CVU linked fund transfer should be able to be done under the same conditions as instant transfer between CBU (BCRA)

At the time the central bank sent the note to banks, reminding them that they must abide by its rules, the barriers to interoperability between the two segments of the financial sector negotiated, as it may have learned. infobae, work in progress. Several major banks have come together in recent weeks with their peers in the fintech sector to seal an agreement that allows them to resolve technical issues that prevent fraud and, at the same time, eliminate the CBU-CVU transfer limit. does.

Banks are aware that they are not following the norms, but they allege that this is the only way to tackle illegal people.

for fintech companies, the subject of caps is important, Many users have taken the habit of converting their money from bank salary account to virtual wallet used for making all kinds of payments, which are more agile to operate, promotions and even specific operations. , such as used to entice you to invest or purchase cryptocurrency. If there are complications in returning the money, many of those benefits cannot be availed.

Many banks do not allow transfers of more than $50,000 a day in a single CVU, others have added an additional step to discourage this, or take 24 hours to credit funds.

in this plane, Mercado Pago has an advantage over other fintech companies, It so happens that having electronic commerce platforms and collection schemes, a major part of the financing of accounts comes through these channels. On the other hand, in less developed wallets, the main means users use to fund themselves are transfers from bank accounts.

Another important aspect of this conflict lies with the so-called 3.0 TransfersThe recently launched scheme to expand payments with “Interoperable QR”, by which All merchant QR readers must accept payments from all digital wallets, banking or fintech. This scheme, strongly supported by BCRA, also requires complete interoperability. If there are still problems then implementing interoperable QR would not be a good precedent In interoperability of transfer between accounts, implemented for more than two years.

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