Let's take look back at the core themes driving MXS 2026 and the key takeaways from this year's standout sessions.

Ready to turn your MXS 2026 insights into action?

Set against the majestic mountain backdrop of Park City, UT,&nbsp; the Money Experience Summit (MXS) 2026 brought together an exclusive gathering of over 100 top financial executives, fintech founders, and policy leaders. Far from the sprawling, noise-heavy standard conferences, MXS focused on high-density signals: real playbooks, uncensored executive dialogues, and actionable growth tactics.
Here is a look back at the core themes driving MXS 2026 and the key takeaways from this year's standout sessions.
<h2>The AI Future of Financial Services</h2>
The first major pillar of MXS 2026 examined how artificial intelligence has restructured the way financial institutions operate, engage, and deliver value to consumers. Instead of reactive self-service, AI facilitates proactive, intelligent action.
<h3>Panel Recap: AI as the Fourth Channel</h3>
Banking has evolved in clear stages: physical branches, web browsers, and mobile apps. This panel unpacked the industry&rsquo;s next major shift: stepping into the fourth channel defined by AI agents and intelligent automation.
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Evolution of Channels: Panelists discussed how moving to agentic banking diverges from past shifts by transforming everyday transactions into proactive, contextual guidance.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Guidance as the Core Product: Delivering timely, personalized advice directly within digital workflows transforms purely transactional relationships into lasting customer loyalty.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Unified Touchpoints: Financial leaders shared actionable strategies for integrating AI agents across physical and digital channels to create a single, context-aware customer experience.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Live Demo: MX&rsquo;s Financial AI Assistant</h3>
Every financial institution now must choose between letting external AI platforms take over the customer interface, building read-only connectors, or owning the experience directly.
At MXS, we demonstrated our newest solution built for institutions that choose to own the primary customer relationship: our newest <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/financial-ai-assistant/">Financial AI Assistant.</a>
How It Works: Operates natively inside your institution's own app, drawing from real, permissioned user data to answer queries, track goals, and execute actions directly on real accounts.
Why It Matters: External consumer AI assistants (ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Grok, Meta Muse) reached for financial institutions en masse this year. If financial service providers do nothing, they risk becoming passive data pipes. MX&rsquo;s Financial AI Assistant gives institutions their own agentic capability by combining bank-grade governance and privacy protections with high-utility, actionable guidance. You keep the relationship, the data, and the context inside your own brand.
See it for yourself: <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/financial-ai-assistant/#access">Request early access</a> to MX&rsquo;s Financial AI Assistant to see how you can deploy an agentic experience inside your own channel.
<h3>Panel: AI Readiness</h3>
While speed is tempting, this panel focused on why discipline beats rushing unvetted tools to market.
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Purpose Over Speed: Moving fast without a solid data foundation creates security risks and damages consumer trust. Successful deployments require clear intent and focused use cases.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Data Infrastructure: Enterprise readiness starts with clean data pipeline architecture and scalable core APIs capable of supporting real-time AI capabilities.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Moving Past the Hype: Leaders shared concrete frameworks for shifting from surface-level generative AI experiments to safe, scalable, and high-impact business outcomes.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Data into Growth</h2>
The second core theme focused on monetization and competitive strategy; specifically how financial institutions can leverage data aggregation, open banking frameworks, and strategic partnerships to drive revenue.
<h3>Keynote: Tactical Transformation in Financial Services with Jason Lazzerini, Central Pacific Bank EVP</h3>
Central Pacific Bank&rsquo;s EVP Jason Lazzerini delivered a sharp strategic roadmap for traditional financial institutions facing rapid disintermediation from big tech platforms like Tesla, Amazon, and X.
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Curator vs. Manufacturer: Trying to manufacture every financial product in-house is a losing strategy against tech giants. Instead, leaders must act as trusted curators recommending best-in-class external solutions.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">The MX Data Advantage: Central Pacific Bank (CPB) leverages MX&rsquo;s data aggregation and clean transaction enrichment infrastructure to track external cash flows and capture primary operating accounts.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Overcoming Internal Inertia: Rather than betting on risky multi-year transformation projects, leaders can prove ROI and protect margins through "containerized" micro-bets&mdash;such as high-yield sweep vehicles, agentic accounts, and automated savings tools.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Live Demo: Revolutionizing Acquisition</h3>
Traditional acquisition forces institutions to spend heavily on ads to get users to open an account right away. MX unveiled WideNet, demonstrating how financial institutions can build relationships before an account is ever opened.
How It Works: Prospective consumers can sign in instantly with just a phone number to a fully functioning financial wellness experience. No social security number, no lengthy onboarding forms. Users connect their existing external accounts to receive immediate rewards and access free financial wellness tools (tracking Spend, Save, Borrow, and Plan behaviors).
Why It Matters: Instead of paying for expensive ad clicks, you acquire engaged users into a branded environment where they track their full financial picture. You gain permissioned visibility into their real cash flow, enabling you to deliver personalized invitations to open accounts when the timing is right. You build an acquisition channel you own, turning strangers into resilient, long-term account holders.
Reinvent Customer Acquisition: Reach out to your representative to discover how your institution can drive acquisition velocity before account opening.
<h3>Panel: Strategic Growth in the Open Finance Era</h3>
Open banking regulation is a growth level, not a compliance checkbox. This panel explored how financial leaders can turn secure data sharing into deeper trust, competitive differentiation, and new revenue streams.
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Navigating the Policy Landscape: With open finance policy evolving across North America and upcoming elections influencing the regulatory horizon, panelists outlined strategies to align short-, medium-, and long-term plans with emerging political realities.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Global Perspectives &amp; Deposit Protection: Examining international models (UK PSD3, Middle East) and small business use cases, the panel highlighted where account aggregation proves most accretive for customers while protecting core bank deposits.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Monetizing Compliance &amp; Smart Implementation: Leaders discussed turning required digital updates into revenue through new partnerships. On the build vs. buy debate, panelists noted that while the "Big 6" banks may build from scratch, smaller institutions must invest strategically in partnerships to acquire capabilities without adding operational complexity.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Beyond the Sessions: The Deer Valley Experience</h2>
Between deep-dive sessions, attendees took full advantage of the Park City mountain setting at the Grand Hyatt Deer Valley. By grounding bold innovation in trusted customer relationships, leaders can move past temporary industry hype and confidently shape the next era of financial services.
MXS 2026 proved once again that the most transformative industry conversations happen when leaders are given the space to step back, connect authentically, and build momentum together.

Far from the sprawling, noise-heavy standard conferences, MXS focused on high-density signals: real playbooks, uncensored executive dialogues, and actionable growth tactics. Let's take a look back at the core themes driving MXS 2026 and the key takeaways from this year's standout sessions.


Shaping the Next Era of Finance: Key Takeaways from MXS 2026

Open Banking biggest untapped advantage is data out. It shows FIs more about their customers and their financial needs. 

See how MX can help you gain the competitive edge data out offers in an Open Banking landscape. 

Most financial institutions focus on the value of Open Banking data in. Discover the overlooked competitive advantages of data out, including stronger loyalty, consumer intent insights, and market intelligence.

The Hidden Competitive Advantage of Open Banking: Why Data Out Matters

Open Banking has reached an inflection point in North America. Recently Canada has moved forward with its consumer-driven banking framework, creating a clearer path for Open Banking adoption. And, while in the United States, regulatory momentum has slowed amid ongoing uncertainty around Section 1033 implementation, relentless market driven momentum continues to drive greater Open Banking forward.&nbsp;
But, many financial institutions continue to see Open Banking as a compliance exercise, or wait for regulations to fully settle before acting. And by doing so, they risk falling behind competitors that are already building data-sharing strategies and consumer experiences around financial connectivity.
More importantly, most financial institutions are already participating in Open Banking whether they've prioritized it or not. Every day, consumers connect accounts to fintech apps, lenders, investment platforms, and competing financial institutions. The question isn't whether data is leaving your institution. It's whether that data movement happens through a governed, visible framework or through processes you can't see, manage, or learn from.
For years, the dominant narrative has been that Open Banking allows financial institutions to aggregate external accounts and gain visibility into consumers' broader financial lives. That value is real, but it's only half the story.
The institutions that embrace data sharing may discover that enabling consumers to connect their accounts elsewhere creates advantages that are equally powerful and often underappreciated.
Here are the three biggest and often overlooked advantages of data out.&nbsp;
<h2>1. Strong Connectivity Drives Loyalty</h2>
Consumers increasingly expect their financial accounts to connect seamlessly to the apps and services they use every day.
<a href="https://www.mx.com/research/financial-apps-fall-short/">MX research</a> found that 72% of consumers would seek out a different financial institution if their preferred provider could not connect to the fintech apps they use regularly. Additionally, 64% of consumers expect to be able to see all of their financial data in one place, and more than half say account connectivity is important to their digital banking experience.
In other words, consumers don't view connectivity as a feature, they view it as an expectation.
Financial institutions that provide secure, reliable connections become easier to do business with. Institutions that create friction around data sharing risk becoming the account consumers leave behind when they look for a better-connected experience.
Just as importantly, consumers increasingly expect transparency and control over how their data is shared. Open Banking enables financial institutions to provide secure, permission-based access where consumers can see who has access to their information and revoke that access at any time. That level of control reinforces trust and helps position the institution, not the fintech, as the steward of the customer's financial data.
<h2>2. Data Requests Reveal Consumer Intent</h2>
Every data-sharing request is an intent signal.
When a consumer connects an account to a mortgage platform, auto lender, investment service, debt management tool, or competing financial institution, they are giving valuable insights to anyone who will listen. Their intent is not to share data, they are seeking an outcome. But, in the process, they're revealing the financial goals actively being pursued.
These signals provide financial institutions with a rare opportunity to engage before a relationship shifts elsewhere.
A connection request to an auto financing platform may indicate a consumer is shopping for a vehicle loan. A connection to a debt management solution could signal an opportunity to offer refinancing options, budgeting guidance, or credit improvement tools.&nbsp;
Rather than viewing outbound data sharing as a customer leaving the ecosystem, financial institutions should instead view it as an opportunity to understand customer intent and deliver relevant products, services, and guidance at precisely the right moment.
In a world where every financial institution is competing to be the consumer's primary financial relationship, the ability to identify intent before the relationship changes can be a powerful competitive advantage.
<h2>3. Open Banking Creates Continuous Market Research</h2>
Traditional market research tells you what consumers say they want.
Open Banking data requests reveal what consumers are actively trying to do.
Patterns in outbound connectivity can help institutions identify emerging consumer needs, growing product categories, and service gaps within their own offerings. If large numbers of consumers are consistently connecting to investment platforms, alternative lending providers, or specialized savings products, that information can help shape future product strategies, partnership decisions, and innovation investments.
The result is a continuous stream of market intelligence built on actual consumer behavior rather than survey responses alone.
For institutions seeking to stay competitive, these insights can help identify opportunities, and threats, long before they appear in traditional reporting.
<h2>Data Out Is Only Valuable If You Can See It</h2>
Historically, much of the financial industry's data sharing has occurred through credential-based screen scraping. In that model, consumers hand over banking credentials to third parties, financial institutions have limited visibility into who is accessing data, and valuable signals about consumer behavior remain hidden.
Modern Open Banking frameworks change that equation.
Secure, tokenized data sharing doesn't just improve security and reliability. It creates visibility. Financial institutions can better understand where customers are engaging across the financial ecosystem and transform previously invisible activity into actionable insight.
The result is more than connectivity. It's awareness.
<h2>The Time to Act Is Now</h2>
The traditional business case for Open Banking has focused on data in; aggregating external accounts, creating holistic financial views, and powering personalized experiences. Those benefits remain essential.
But, the institutions that move early will also capture the often-overlooked advantages of data out: stronger customer loyalty, deeper insight into consumer intent, and ongoing market intelligence that informs future growth.
Every financial institution is competing to remain its customers' primary financial relationship. The challenge is that many of the decisions that determine that relationship happen outside the institution's walls.
The institutions that embrace Open Banking early won't simply gain a more complete view of their customers' finances. They'll gain visibility into customer intent, emerging market opportunities, and competitive threats before those relationships are lost.
With <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/data-access/">MX Data Access</a> solutions, financial institutions can enable secure, consumer-permissioned data sharing while unlocking the connectivity, insights, and innovation opportunities that define the future of financial services.
The question is no longer whether consumers will share their financial data. It's whether your institution will be positioned to learn from it.

The Untapped Competitive Advantage of Open Banking

Account aggregation leads to better financial wellness  and MX platform users have a clearer picture than the average consumer.

See every account, every connection, all in one place — powered by MX.

Fragmented financial lives make money management harder than ever. Discover how account aggregation helps consumers gain visibility, reduce stress, and improve financial health.

Why Financial Wellness Starts with Account Aggregation

Consumers today aren&rsquo;t managing just one financial account, they&rsquo;re managing an entire financial ecosystem.
From checking and savings accounts to credit cards, payment apps, retirement funds, mortgages, and loans, financial lives are spread across multiple products, platforms, and institutions. While access to more financial tools should create more control, it often creates the opposite &mdash; fragmentation, confusion, and financial fatigue.
<a href="https://www.mx.com/research/financial-health-tension/">MX&rsquo;s latest survey</a> of more than 1,000 U.S. adults found that financial health in 2026 is defined by tension &mdash; between optimism and stress, intention and execution, and awareness and clarity. Consumers want to improve their financial lives, but many struggle to fully understand where they stand.
The challenge for many lies more in a lack of visibility rather than <a href="https://www.mx.com/research/engagement-drives-stronger-financial-wellness/">a lack of engagement</a>.
When consumers can clearly see and understand their complete financial picture, they are better equipped to make confident decisions, reduce stress, and move toward greater financial wellness. That&rsquo;s where account aggregation becomes essential, and where financial providers have an opportunity to positively impact their customers.&nbsp;
<h2>Financial Lives Are More Complex Than Consumers Realize</h2>
Despite actively attempting to manage their money, most consumers&rsquo; finances are spread across too many places to make that easy.
MX research found that the average consumer holds 3.6 financial accounts across multiple institutions. The most commonly held types of accounts by consumers are:&nbsp;
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Checking accounts (86%)</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Savings accounts (72%)</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Credit cards (62%)</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Payment apps like Venmo, PayPal, or Cash App (43%)&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
These accounts are now standard parts of everyday financial life, and adding retirement accounts, investments, mortgages, and loans, and the picture becomes even more complicated.&nbsp;
But, even as nearly every financial provider offers some combination of these account types, consumers often hold accounts across multiple providers. While 76% of consumers identify a primary financial institution, only 25% say they keep all of their accounts there.
That means most people piece together their financial lives from managing separate apps, checking multiple balances, and trying to mentally connect disconnected information.
Even among engaged consumers, this creates friction. While 44% say they track every dollar and know exactly where their money goes, the majority of these consumers still rely on checking individual accounts (37%), spreadsheets (21%), or budgeting apps (16%) to stay organized.
Again, the effort from consumers is there, but often the tolls they need are not.
<h2>Financial Fatigue Creates Avoidance</h2>
When financial management feels overwhelming, stress follows.
More than half of consumers (51%) say money is their primary source of stress, and 49% say thinking about their finances makes them anxious. For many, that anxiety leads to avoidance rather than action.
Seventeen percent of consumers say they avoid checking their finances altogether.
Among those who avoid checking:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">48% say looking at finances makes them anxious</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">34% worry they&rsquo;ll get bad news</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">21% feel they lack control</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">19% lack confidence in their ability to manage finances</li>
</ul>
This is where fragmented finances transcend an annoyance to become a legitimate barrier to financial wellness.
<h2>MX Helps Bring Hidden Financial Lives to Light</h2>
At MX, <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/account-aggregation/">account aggregation</a> goes beyond convenience &mdash; it creates financial clarity.
While survey respondents report holding an average of 3.6 financial accounts, MX platform users link external accounts 3 accounts per user on average. But, the real insight comes from what happens next.
Through transfer analysis, MX identifies an average of 3 additional &ldquo;discovered&rsquo; accounts per user from transfers to and from held accounts.
That means consumers often have more active financial relationships than they realize. These &ldquo;hidden&rdquo; accounts &mdash; forgotten savings accounts, old external checking accounts, secondary credit products, or disconnected payment platforms &mdash; can quietly contribute to financial stress and incomplete decision-making.
Without visibility into those accounts, consumers are often making financial decisions based on partial information.
MX helps surface those missing pieces.
By bringing external accounts into view and connecting fragmented financial data, MX gives users a more complete understanding of their financial lives. This enables stronger financial guidance, better decision-making, and a clearer path from financial stability to long-term progress.
And, when financial institutions can provide that clarity, they move beyond being account providers: they become trusted partners in financial wellness.

Open Banking can unlock a new wave of innovation that helps financial institutions fuel growth.

Open Banking has the potential to unlock a new wave of innovation with benefits for both institutions and the consumers.

How Banks Drive Innovation with Open Banking

Over 10,000 years ago, the people of Tasmania became geographically isolated as rising seas formed the Bass Strait. Cut off from the mainland, a population of a few thousand hunter-gatherers gradually lost complexity in their tools and techniques. Archaeological evidence shows that innovations didn&rsquo;t just slow, but they actually reversed. Tools became simpler, and some technologies disappeared entirely.
Anthropologist Rhys Jones described this phenomenon as the &ldquo;slow strangulation of the mind.&rdquo; It wasn&rsquo;t a sudden collapse, but a gradual decline caused by isolation from broader networks of knowledge and exchange. Meanwhile, the populations that remained connected continued to innovate and advance.
Progress depends on connectivity. Isolation doesn&rsquo;t preserve strength, but actually quietly erodes it. And, this lesson applies perfectly to the world of banking.
<h2>Banks Achieve Connection with Open Banking</h2>
Today, financial institutions are faced with a valuable opportunity to achieve progress with connection &mdash; and greater knowledge to create better customer experiences. <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/what-is-open-banking/">Open Banking</a> &mdash; the structured and secure consumer-permissioned sharing of data &mdash; has the potential to unlock a new wave of innovation with benefits for both institutions and the consumers. Connection through an open banking investment helps financial institutions fuel growth.
Financial institutions that leverage Open Banking can use consumer-permissioned data to offer better products and services to their customers. And, those offers can be personalized so that consumers have a better financial experience, allowing for more sophisticated ways for consumers to interact with their banks.&nbsp;
With Open Banking, consumers are able to have a 360-degree view of their financial accounts. They&rsquo;ll also be able to easily transfer funds and manage their money. And, data that leads to a personalized financial experience is an expectation that consumers hold for their providers. <a href="https://www.mx.com/research/crossing-the-chasm-consumer-demand-mobile-experiences/">MX found</a> that 59% of consumers reported that they expect their financial provider to leverage the data they have about them to personalize their experience.
<h2>Solving for the Hesitations</h2>
Today, many institutions remain hesitant about Open Banking, concerned about competition, data sharing, and control. These concerns are not unfounded as financial institutions should always prioritize protecting their consumers&rsquo; data.
But in trying to protect themselves and their customers, institutions risk a dangerous cost: isolating themselves from the broader financial ecosystem &mdash; and reversing the progress that connection has allowed.&nbsp;
Operational policy, usage-based fees on data access, additional authentication layers, or administrative controls that introduce friction into every interaction are the very acts of isolation that halt progress. That&rsquo;s exactly why the industry must advocate for consumer-first data sharing. The decline isn't quick. Rather, it&rsquo;s a gradual decline that slowly separates the institution from the technology and ecosystem around them.
<h2>How MX Creates Connection</h2>
In a world where consumers expect seamless, connected financial experiences, institutions that fail to integrate and collaborate may find themselves left behind. Not because they lacked capability, but because they lacked connection.
The future of banking will not be built in silos. It will be built through networks that fuel growth. MX is the solution to the connection challenges for fintechs and banks of any size. As financial institutions improve knowledge across the organization through connection, MX&rsquo;s <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/data-access/">data access solution</a> helps these institutions implement open banking strategies by:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Providing access to secure APIs and OAuth connections</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Working across data intermediaries for the most complete data access coverage</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Giving consumers complete control over the ability to grant and revoke access to data</li>
</ul>
And, with MX, data becomes a key solution to <a href="https://www.mx.com/data-into-growth/">solving for the biggest barriers to growth</a> and drives innovation forward.

Why Connection Is the Greatest Strength in Banking

At MXS 2026, finance leaders met in Park City to tackle banking’s next hurdle: compliance and governance in an AI-driven world.

Check out MX Max, our new Financial AI Assistant

The industry&rsquo;s top risk, regulatory, and fintech experts gathered in Park City at MXS 2026 to address banking&rsquo;s next major hurdle: managing the compliance, identity, and governance challenge of an AI-driven world.
Our AI Readiness panel was moderated by Jane Barratt (Chief Advocacy Officer, MX) and featured panelists Tom Wells (Chief Risk Officer, Primitive), Hasan Akbar (Partner Director, Fintech &amp; Alliances, Candescent), and Neff Hudson (Principal, Castle Hills Consulting).
The panel zeroed in on the increase in consumers delegating tasks to autonomous AI agents and why that means traditional risk frameworks, Know Your Customer (KYC) regulations, and vendor validation models must evolve.
<h2>1. Friction as a Feature: Safeguarding Customer Trust&nbsp;</h2>
As digital experiences become hyper-frictionless, the risk landscape expands exponentially. While many consumers expect instant execution, they also realize the need for rigorous identity and verification processes in order to protect sensitive transactions.
&ldquo;Friction is a feature, not a bug &hellip; We&rsquo;ve got to defend that most as an industry, because KYC is your client trust moat.&rdquo; &mdash;Neff Hudson, Castle Hills Consulting
Rather than treating compliance as a static gate, forward-looking institutions are using AI for real-time risk correction to automatically alter trigger words or adjust responses within risk thresholds before presenting files, all under human spot-checking.
<h2>2. Moving Beyond &ldquo;Black Box&rdquo; Vendor Models</h2>
A primary operational headache for risk teams is validating fourth-party AI models (e.g. Google Vertex or Microsoft) bundled inside third-party vendor solutions. Regulators won&rsquo;t accept &ldquo;black box&rdquo; excuses when models drift or hallucinate.
&ldquo;When you&rsquo;re engaging with a vendor, make sure you understand what LLMs or foundation models they&rsquo;re using, what evidence you&rsquo;ll be able to get from those black-box models, and if that&rsquo;s sufficient &hellip; If you don&rsquo;t get those questions answered early, downstream they will stop moving into production.&rdquo; &mdash;Hasan Akbar, Candescent
Neff Hudson offered a pragmatic test for evaluating any AI solution presented by a vendor:
&ldquo;People spend a lot of time showing you how their model works. My first question is: Did they show me how it breaks? What happens when it gives you a big bad answer?&rdquo; &mdash;Neff Hudson, Castle Hills Consulting
<h2>3. Introducing KYA: Know Your Agent</h2>
As autonomous agents begin knocking on open banking API endpoints to open accounts or initiate transfers, traditional KYC falls short. The industry is witnessing a shift toward KYA (Know Your Agent) standards.
Tom Wells outlined Primitive&rsquo;s work on establishing an open industry standard for agent validation, anchored by key trust verification questions:
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/fc805193-4d45-458f-8e2c-de9ca9838393?width=null&amp;height=null" alt="Kya Trust Framework" />
&ldquo;When someone knocks on an API endpoint in open banking to open a new account, should we trust it? KYA doesn&rsquo;t replace KYC. If you don&rsquo;t have trust between the agent and KYC, you should not engage with that agent.&rdquo; &mdash;Tom Wells, Primitive
To safeguard consumers against rogue agents, Hasan Akbar advocated for risk-tiered authority envelopes and Independent Validation Checks (IVCs):
&ldquo;Think of agent activity in risk tiers. Low risk is discovery mode, like a super-powered Google search. The secondary tier is high risk&mdash;anything that reaches into a transaction, re-authenticates, and brings the human back in. The third tier is outside the envelope of authority &hellip; if an agent is authorized to move $100 from Bank A to Bank B, but reroutes it to a sketchy offshore bank, IVC protocols re-engage the human to confirm.&rdquo; &mdash;Hasan Akbar, Candescent
<h2>4. Innovation Compression: From 18 Months to 90 Days</h2>
The panel concluded on a note of optimism. While managing AI risk can feel daunting, the compression of innovation cycles allows institutions to deliver contextual, hyper-personalized experiences faster than ever before.
&ldquo;Instead of thinking about the world as &lsquo;this could cause my deposit run-off,&rsquo; think about: &lsquo;I can hyper-personalize and offer-match my clients in real time &hellip; I can build deeper contextual relationships.&rdquo; &mdash;Jane Barratt, MX
Reflecting on the conversations at MXS, it was inspiring to see leaders across financial services come together in Park City with such clarity of purpose. Panels like this remind us that the future of finance belongs to those willing to innovate alongside their customers. When consumers win, institutions win.

This panel zeroed in on the increase in consumers delegating tasks to autonomous AI agents and why that means traditional risk frameworks, Know Your Customer (KYC) regulations, and vendor validation models must evolve.

The New Rules of Risk: Key Takeaways on AI Readiness from MXS 2026

A current list of the top U.S. financial data aggregators, what each one does, and how to compare them.

Learn more about how MX enables faster, more dependable connections.

A current list of the top financial data aggregators in the U.S., what each one does, and how to compare them for your financial institution.

Top Financial Data Aggregators in the United States

Financial data aggregators connect to consumers&rsquo; accounts at many financial institutions, with permission, and deliver that data in one place. This list of financial data aggregators covers five leading financial data aggregation companies in the U.S., so you can find the right data aggregator or see who touches your accountholders&rsquo; data.
<h2>What Is Financial Data Aggregation?</h2>
Financial data aggregation, also known as <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/what-is-account-aggregation/">account aggregation</a>, brings information from accounts at different financial institutions and fintechs into one place. Consumers can connect checking, savings, investment, credit card, mortgage, and HSA accounts to see their finances together.
Financial providers, meanwhile, see only a fragment of a consumer&rsquo;s financial picture and lack visibility into where consumers share data from their systems. Not all connections work the same way. Financial institutions and fintechs can enable account linking in three main ways:
<ol>
<li>Screen scraping or credential sharing: <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/screen-scraping-vs-bank-apis-whats-the-difference/">Screen scraping</a> requires consumers to share their username and password with the data recipient to gain access to their data.</li>
<li>Whitelisted IPs: This allows a financial institution to sanction data sharing with specific IP addresses to see who is accessing its consumers&rsquo; data.</li>
<li>Open finance APIs or open banking APIs: <a href="https://www.mx.com/use-cases/open-finance/">Open finance APIs</a> let consumers share transaction data without usernames and passwords, replacing credentials with tokens for higher security, faster speeds, and higher connection success rates.</li>
</ol>
With screen scraping and whitelisted IPs, connections frequently break, and consumers are left wondering who has access to their data. That frustration can <a href="https://www.mx.com/whitepapers/open-finance-creates-a-better-money-experience/">cost companies in the long run</a> as consumers look for a better experience. Businesses also get little visibility into where data is shared. <a href="https://www.mx.com/guides/open-finance/">Open Finance</a> puts the consumer in control of their data with a secure, easier way to connect accounts into a single view.
<h2>Top Financial Data Aggregators in the U.S.</h2>
Major financial data aggregators in the U.S. include MX, Mastercard (Finicity), Plaid, Yodlee, and Akoya.
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>Aggregator</td>
<td>Focus</td>
<td>One Verified Fact</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>MX</td>
<td>Account aggregation, insights, Financial Wellness</td>
<td>Above 99% connection success for client <a href="https://www.mx.com/case-studies/informative-research/">Informative Research</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Mastercard (Finicity)</td>
<td>Financial data APIs, credit decisioning</td>
<td>Now operates as part of Mastercard Open Finance</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Plaid</td>
<td>Connecting apps to bank accounts</td>
<td>Supports over 12,000 financial institutions, per Plaid</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Yodlee</td>
<td>Data aggregation, Open Finance, data analytics</td>
<td>Joined the STG portfolio in 2025</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Akoya</td>
<td>API-connected data access network</td>
<td>Works with more than 4,300 financial institutions, per Akoya</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<h3>MX Technologies, Inc.</h3>
MX&rsquo;s <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/account-aggregation/">account aggregation</a> solutions let consumers easily connect and view all of their financial accounts in one place. They also give financial providers full visibility into consumer financial data. MX uses tokenized access, so an app gets a secure token instead of the consumer&rsquo;s password. MX client <a href="https://www.mx.com/case-studies/informative-research/">Informative Research</a> improved its connection success rates to above 99%. MX also provides Financial Wellness, financial insights, and mobile banking solutions.
<h3>Mastercard Finicity</h3>
Finicity launched its first financial product in 2000 and has since grown to provide financial data APIs, credit decisioning tools, and financial wellness solutions. Mastercard acquired it in 2020, and Finicity now operates as part of Mastercard Open Finance.
<h3>Plaid</h3>
Plaid connects apps to bank accounts, claiming it supports over 12,000 financial institutions and over 9,000 digital financial services. In November 2023, it formed a separate consumer reporting agency for lending insights from cash flow data, according to Plaid&rsquo;s announcement.
<h3>Yodlee</h3>
Yodlee was founded in 1999 and was owned by Envestnet from 2015 until 2025, when the private equity firm STG bought it. Yodlee provides data aggregation, Open Finance, and data analytics to financial institutions and their clients.
<h3>Akoya</h3>
Akoya was established in 2020. It runs a 100% API-connected data access network, so consumers never share their login credentials with a third-party app. Akoya claims it works with more than 4,300 financial institutions.
<h2>How to Compare Data Aggregators</h2>
The right financial aggregator depends on your use case. MX offers tokenized access and API data for identity, statements, transactions, balances, and account verifications. Mastercard Open Finance, which includes Finicity, describes itself as enabling secure, consumer-permissioned sharing of financial data.
To compare any two, including MX and Finicity, test the same criteria:
<ul>
<li>The share of direct connections through an <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/data-access/">open banking API</a> vs. screen scraping</li>
<li>Coverage for your accountholders&rsquo; institutions</li>
<li>How long connections last</li>
<li>The data types you need, such as <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/instant-account-verifications/">instant account verification</a></li>
<li>How fixes get handled when a connection breaks</li>
</ul>
If you&rsquo;re asking which financial data aggregator has the best authentication, check how many connections use tokens instead of passwords. See our <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/questions-to-ask-when-looking-for-a-financial-aggregator/">questions to ask a financial aggregator</a> and how to <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/how-to-choose-an-open-banking-data-partner/">choose an open banking data partner</a> for more.
<h2>What&rsquo;s Next for Open Finance</h2>
In the U.S. and Canada, open banking and open finance adoption has been primarily market-driven so far. The <a href="https://financialdataexchange.org/fdx-feed/as-ai-agents-get-involved-in-financial-data-sharing-leading-standards-body-launches-initiative-to-stay-ahead/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Financial Data Exchange (FDX)</a>, the industry group behind the main U.S. data-sharing standard, reports that more than 114 million customer accounts are connected through APIs on its standard, as of April 2026. <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/canada-open-banking/">Canada is building its system</a>.
In the U.S., a federal court blocked enforcement of the CFPB&rsquo;s 2024 Section 1033 rule on Oct. 29, 2025, while the CFPB reconsiders it. The CFPB&rsquo;s new proposal has been under White House review since Aug. 4, 2026. See how <a href="https://www.mx.com/1033-reopened/">1033 reopened</a> affects financial institutions.
<h2>Businesses Can&rsquo;t Afford for Connections to Break</h2>
MX research found that <a href="https://www.mx.com/research/consumer-research-digital-and-mobile-banking/">72% of consumers</a> would seek out a different bank or credit union if their current one couldn&rsquo;t connect to their favorite fintech apps.
Partnering with a financial data aggregator, regardless of who you choose to work with, is one of the best ways to become the primary financial institution for your consumers, since it offers a full view of their finances within your app.
Learn more about how MX enables faster, more dependable connections with <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/account-aggregation/">MX Account Aggregation Solutions</a>.
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/406138d7-e413-4b7b-985d-1d106dbaf233?width=985&amp;height=886" alt="Account Aggregation.png" />
<h2>FAQs</h2>
<h3>What is a financial data aggregator?</h3>
A financial data aggregator is a company that connects to consumers&rsquo; accounts at many financial institutions, with permission, and delivers that data in one place. Consumers can see checking, savings, credit card, investment, and loan data together. Financial institutions and fintechs use aggregators to power account linking, verification, budgeting tools, and lending decisions without building every connection themselves.
<h3>How do data aggregators connect to accounts?</h3>
Data aggregators connect through screen scraping, whitelisted IPs, or open finance APIs. Screen scraping uses the consumer&rsquo;s username and password. Whitelisted IPs let a financial institution approve specific addresses to access data. Open finance APIs replace credentials with tokens, which brings higher security, faster speeds, and higher connection success rates. Direct API connections are generally more dependable than the other two methods.
<h3>Who are the top financial data aggregators in the U.S.?</h3>
Major financial data aggregators in the U.S. include MX, Mastercard (Finicity), Plaid, Yodlee, and Akoya. MX uses tokenized access instead of passwords. Finicity now operates as part of Mastercard Open Finance. Plaid says it supports over 12,000 financial institutions. Yodlee joined the STG portfolio in 2025. Akoya runs a 100% API-connected data access network and claims it works with more than 4,300 financial institutions.
<h3>How do I compare MX and Finicity?</h3>
Compare MX and Finicity by testing the same criteria for your use case. Check coverage for your accountholders&rsquo; institutions, the share of direct API connections, how long connections last, and the data types offered, such as identity, transactions, balances, and account verifications. Also ask how each handles fixes when a connection breaks. Run a pilot with your own accountholders to see how each performs in practice.
<h3>What is happening with Section 1033?</h3>
A federal court blocked enforcement of the CFPB&rsquo;s 2024 Section 1033 rule in October 2025. The CFPB&rsquo;s new proposal has been under White House review since Aug. 4, 2026. The rule&rsquo;s future is still uncertain, so financial institutions should keep building toward secure, API-based data sharing.

A List of Financial Data Aggregators in the United States

MX | Agentic Banking Is Here

This week, Axios <a href="https://www.axios.com/2026/10/22/ai-agents-banks-unauthorized-accounts-access">reported</a> that major U.S. banks are detecting third-party AI agents operating inside customer accounts. Banks are blocking some of that access and <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/13/jpmorgan-ai-agents-account-access.html">rewriting their terms of service</a>. Their core problem is that they often can&rsquo;t tell whether an agent is acting on a customer&rsquo;s instructions or has gone off script.
The concern is legitimate. But the long term answer isn&rsquo;t to shut the door on agents, because customers want them. People will use AI to budget, find savings, and manage their money, and banks know it. The better answer is to give agents a safe way in, and provide clear guard rails around how they are allowed to operate in the financial data world to keep consumers safe.
Much of what&rsquo;s alarming the industry is customers handing their usernames and passwords to an AI assistant or enabling screen sharing via open windows. That is screen scraping with a new face. The industry spent years moving away from credential-based access toward tokenized, consented APIs, and the agentic era shouldn&rsquo;t reverse that progress.
Many groups are working on the answer, and that&rsquo;s healthy. Standards bodies, financial-data networks, banks, regulators, emerging open initiatives like the <a href="https://www.agenticfinanceprotocol.org/">Agentic Financial Services Protocol (AFSP)</a>, and AI platform providers are all developing approaches to agent identity, authorization, and risk. Each group brings its own focus and its own equities, and the technology is moving faster than any one of them can set the rules. We don&rsquo;t think this is a race for one group to win. Whichever standard or standards the industry ends up adopting, they should hold to the same core principles. That is what we laid out in our response to FDX&rsquo;s call for input on agentic AI, and here is the short version.
In our response to the Financial Data Exchange&rsquo;s call for input on agentic AI in May 2026, we laid out how to do this. Here are the principles we believe the industry should adopt.
<ol>
<li> Credentials are never the door. Agents should access accounts through tokenized, API-based connections, not logins shared with a bot. Credential access weakens accountability for any kind of client, and agents make that weakness more dangerous. </li>
<li> Know your agent operator. An agent is software. The accountable party is the organization that deploys it. Operators should be identifiable legal entities with published data-handling commitments, incident-notification obligations, and testing evidence proportionate to their risk. This should map to the third-party risk processes banks already run. </li>
<li> Make agents distinguishable from humans on every request. Banks can&rsquo;t govern what they can&rsquo;t see. Agent identity, such as operator, agent type, and deployment, should travel as signed claims in the authorization token, so it can&rsquo;t be stripped or altered along the way. Only then can a bank require human-in-the-loop verification for sensitive actions, like account opening or money movement. </li>
<li> Consent must be bounded by purpose, time, and scope. Consent should describe what an agent may do, not just what it can read. We recommend layered action classes, ranging from viewing data to acting on an account, with the exact definitions set through industry standards work. Each class implies the ones below it and requires additional consent. Customers should be told plainly when an agent is involved, what it can do with and without a human-in-the-loop, and how to revoke access. </li>
<li> Keep a human in the loop for anything irreversible. Agents can work autonomously on reversible tasks like summarizing or budgeting. For money movement or account closure, the agent should propose an action that the customer approves through a separate channel. That keeps most of the benefit and protects the rare moments where mistakes are permanent. </li>
<li> Limit what data the agent can see. A common trick against AI tools uses hidden instructions inside plain text, like memo lines or payment names. Sending clean, structured data (like standard merchant names and clear amounts) instead of raw text reduces these safety risks. Restricting AI to set commands also keeps it on track if someone tries to trick it. </li>
<li> Be realistic about deleting data and accountability. Today&rsquo;s AI models can&rsquo;t completely "unlearn" information they&rsquo;ve processed. What companies can and must offer is zero data retention at the model level, no training on user information, and strict rules for any sub-vendors handling data. </li>
<li> Build on standards, don&rsquo;t fragment them. The industry doesn&rsquo;t need a net new standard for every new technology. It should extend work like FAPI, NIST&rsquo;s emerging agent guidance, and FDX&rsquo;s existing risk frameworks, and define only what is specific to financial data. An &ldquo;Agent-Safe&rdquo; profile combining signed metadata, action-class scopes, standardized tool-call formats, and operator certification would give banks a simple standard to require and give AI platforms one integration to build.</li>
</ol>
<h3>What This Means for Banks and AI Builders</h3>
Banks that block all AI access will frustrate customers over time without removing risk, as users will simply look for workarounds. A stronger path is offering a secure, visible, and controllable way in, and asking AI companies to use it.
AI developers should expect to meet these standards. Banks will grant access to known providers whose AI tools are well-controlled and open to audits. As such, we strongly encourage leading LLM developers and AI platform providers to join these open industry dialogues and help co-create these expanded frameworks. Their experience, insights, and participation would be invaluable to building safe, innovative standards that empower consumers and move the entire ecosystem forward.
At MX, we build the <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/data-enhancement/">data</a> and <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/financial-ai-assistant/">AI infrastructure</a> that financial institutions run on. We believe agentic banking can be safe, consented, and accountable, but only if the industry builds the rails before significant traffic arrives.

As AI innovation continues, banks need to give agents a safe way in and provide clear guard rails around how they are allowed to operate in the financial data world to keep consumers safe.

Agentic Banking Is Here. Here’s What Financial Institutions Should Consider Today

Financial wellness is a long-term defense mechanism and the defining metric of institutional survival in the digital age.

Request a live demo to explore how your institution can scale consumer financial wellness today.

At MXS 2026, industry leaders gathered to tackle one of the most urgent shifts in financial services: integrating consumer financial wellness into the core mechanics of long-term business growth. Moderated by Kiah Haslett (Creator, Fintech Takes Banking), the panel brought together Mike Rust (President, Betterment), Meghan Kober (SVP, Strategic Partnerships, U.S. Bank), Shane McWilliams (Head of Retail Banking, FIS), Cory Newsom (Digital Channels Executive, USAA), and Joey Lishia (Product Manager, Financial Health, Ally Bank).
The consensus? Financial wellness is a long-term defense mechanism, an engine for customer lifetime value, and the defining metric of institutional survival in the digital age. Here are the four key takeaways:
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/d1c3626f-f68b-4138-b345-42bed680ca04?width=4986&amp;height=3324" alt="26 Mxs Afternoon Sessions1 V1" />
<h2>1. Defending Consumers in the &ldquo;Attention and Friction Economy&rdquo;</h2>
While institutions race to optimize digital channels, consumers face an increasingly hostile financial environment. Widespread sports betting, prediction markets, predatory short-term lending, and gamified trading apps (&ldquo;social trading&rdquo;) actively siphon liquidity out of traditional deposit accounts.
<blockquote>
&ldquo;How overloaded are we every day with marketing and ads wanting people to spend money? There has to be somebody that stands up for the consumer and builds smart tools to help them manage their life, not just compete in the attention economy.&rdquo; &mdash;Joey Lishia, Ally Bank
</blockquote>
Rather than treating accounts as static, historical ledgers, forward-thinking financial institutions are shifting toward forward-looking systems that provide clarity, control, and automated guardrails.
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Ally Bank focuses on structural nudges like automated savings and spending &ldquo;buckets,&rdquo; framing behavioral change around passive, &ldquo;set-it-and-forget-it&rdquo; habits modeled after the success of the 401k.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">U.S. Bank is leaning directly into the attention economy by meeting consumers where they spend their time by using creative partnerships to capture mindshare before predatory alternatives do.</li>
</ul>
<h2>2. Shifting from Paternalism to AI-Powered &ldquo;Receptive Timing&rdquo;</h2>
A common pitfall in financial guidance is coming across as overly preachy or paternalistic. As USAA&rsquo;s Cory Newsom pointed out, telling an 18-year-old service member not to buy a sports car with their first bonus usually backfires when it sounds like a lecture from a parent.
<blockquote>
&ldquo;We don&rsquo;t want to be your dad &hellip; coming across like your dad trying to tell you what to do. We have to wait until the consumer is ready to listen &hellip; That&rsquo;s when you give the message.&rdquo; &mdash;Cory Newsom, USAA
</blockquote>
The breakthrough isn&rsquo;t just what advice is given, but when and how it is delivered:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">USAA&rsquo;s signal-driven engagement leverages machine learning and transactional data to detect when a member is actively seeking guidance and delivering real-time advice precisely when the consumer is receptive.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">U.S. Bank&rsquo;s LLM &amp; AI scenario simulation explores where consumers can test different financial levers by viewing short-term and long-term trade-offs side by side.</li>
</ul>
<h2>3. Agentic AI &amp; The Next Frontier for Open Banking</h2>
The panel tackled the emergence of autonomous or &ldquo;agentic&rdquo; AI tools, such as Facebook&rsquo;s Muse or standalone LLMs, that can scan accounts, execute transfers, track price drops, and optimize yields automatically.
While some fear that agentic AI will trigger friction-free deposit flight to high-yield accounts, the panelists viewed open access as an imperative.
<blockquote>
&ldquo;Sticking your head in the sand isn&rsquo;t an option for financial institutions. How can people like us on the stage help these FIs to safely &hellip; give people what they want? Because it&rsquo;s going to happen one way or another.&rdquo; &mdash;Shane McWilliams, FIS
</blockquote>
Consumers are already confiding financial queries into LLMs rather than traditional advisors. Institutions must ensure their APIs and product suites can seamlessly interface with these external agents rather than attempting to wall off access.
Mike Reust from Betterment emphasized that true financial wellness requires holistic coordination across all accounts, tax structures, and family goals. Unifying fragmented accounts (where consumers hold five to eight separate banking relationships) gives individuals the confidence to stick to long-term wealth plans.
<h2>4. Playing the Long Game: Connecting Wellness to Bottom-Line ROI</h2>
Connecting financial wellness directly to immediate, single-quarter ROI remains challenging. However, as Shane McWilliams noted, measuring customer longevity, total relationship balance, and churn reduction proves the long-term profitability model.
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Community Banks as Agility Engines: Regional and community financial institutions hold a structural advantage: hyper-local consumer insights. By leveraging modern core ecosystems, they can tailor hyper-personalized digital experiences for underserved markets like small and medium businesses.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">The Vanguard Effect: Mike Reust mentioned the impact of Vanguard making investing as accessible as it is today and how that was a crucial piece of its success. Institutions that genuinely align product features with positive customer outcomes build lasting brand equity. Over time, doing right by the consumer translates directly into deposit stability, lower acquisition costs, and higher retention.</li>
</ul>
<blockquote>
&ldquo;Make it a part of your strategy and commit to it &hellip; If you make it part of your story, it gives you a genuine platform. Invest in these features, do right by the customer, and business results will follow.&rdquo; &mdash;Joey Lishia, Ally Bank
</blockquote>
Building products that empower customers is the ultimate competitive advantage in modern financial services. When institutions leverage AI to meet users at the right moment, open up distribution through modern APIs, and align product design with beneficial customer outcomes, financial wellness becomes an engine that naturally drives long-term deposit stability and business growth.
Reflecting on the conversations at MXS 2026, it was inspiring to see leaders across financial services come together in Park City with such clarity of purpose. Panels like this remind us that the future of finance belongs to those willing to innovate alongside their customers.

Financial wellness is a long-term defense mechanism, an engine for customer lifetime value, and the defining metric of institutional survival in the digital age.

Winning the Long Game: Highlights from MXS 2026’s Financial Wellness Panel

A look inside Matt West's (MX CRO) Finovate keynote surrounding the paradigm shift toward agentic banking.

Don’t let third party platforms disintermediate your customer relationships.

See MX’s Financial AI Assistant in Action

Taking the stage at Finovate 2026, MX Chief Revenue Officer <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewcwest/">Matt West</a> opened with a direct challenge to financial institutions: the era of mobile banking primacy is ending, and the age of agentic banking has arrived.
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/c81b6ae2-d8ae-4dbd-a661-ba9c74a6740a?width=3213&amp;height=5712" alt="Img 0185" />
<h2>The Three Phases of AI: How Fast We Got Here</h2>
West mapped out how rapidly artificial intelligence transformed since ChatGPT&rsquo;s release in November 2022:
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Phase One (The Brain): Centralized, conversational access to world knowledge.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Phase Two (Harnesses and Agents): A brief, 11-month transition where models gained memory, scaffolding, and digital &ldquo;hands and eyes&rdquo; through tools like open-source harnesses and Claude Co-work.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Phase Three (The Age of Context): Where we stand today.</li>
</ol>
<blockquote>
&ldquo;Think of a college student who just graduated and entered your company,&rdquo; West explained. &ldquo;They&rsquo;re intelligent, but they don&rsquo;t know what to do, how far to take it, or what &lsquo;good&rsquo; looks like. You have to train them.&rdquo;
</blockquote>
For banks, investing in training AI with deep institutional and customer context is what turns raw model intelligence into reliable, compound value.
<h2>A Brief History of Banking Channels</h2>
To highlight the gravity of today&rsquo;s shift, West placed agentic AI along banking&rsquo;s 4,000-year timeline:
<table data-path-to-node="13">
<thead>
<tr>
<td>Epoch</td>
<td>Milestone</td>
<td>Key Technological Catalyst</td>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>2000 BC</td>
<td>The First Bank Branch</td>
<td>Physical infrastructure in ancient Babylon</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>1995</td>
<td>Online Banking</td>
<td>Wells Fargo launches account access via the web</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>2007</td>
<td>Mobile Banking</td>
<td>Apple launches the iPhone &amp; App Store</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>2026+</td>
<td>Agentic Banking</td>
<td>Frontier AI models &amp; real-time financial orchestration</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
Just as smartphones displaced desktop-only banking, and as the internet displaced physical branch appointments before that, AI platforms are creating a brand new primary channel.
<h2>The Existential Threat: Consumers Aren&rsquo;t Waiting for Banks</h2>
West explained that while most financial institutions spend their AI budgets on back-office automation and internal productivity, consumers are taking matters into their own hands.
Today, users are connecting their financial accounts directly into ChatGPT, MetaAI, Gemini, and others to analyze their spending and seek advice. This disintermediation poses a serious threat to traditional institutions. In response, banks are exploring three paths:
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Consumer-Led AI Connection: Customers export their data directly into general-purpose LLMs (High risk of disintermediation and poor visibility for the bank).</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Managed MCP/Connectors: Banks build controlled Model Context Protocol (MCP) integrations, allowing secure data flow and observability directly inside tools like Claude or ChatGPT.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Embedded Frontier: FIs bring native, frontier-level AI directly into their digital banking apps to offer deep, hyper-personalized advisory services.</li>
</ol>
<h2>Asking the Unanswerable Financial Questions</h2>
To prove why traditional digital banking falls short, West posed several common life questions consumers face daily:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">I&rsquo;m buying a car. Should I pay cash, take out a loan, or lease?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Will I be ready to pay for my kid&rsquo;s college tuition when the time comes?</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Is now the right time for me to refinance my home loan?</li>
</ul>
Most banks lack the staff, tools, or real-time data integration to answer these questions at scale. Combined with open banking data and deterministic financial records, AI makes personalized advice accessible to every customer.
<h2>Seven Pillars of Agentic Banking</h2>
Building a trusted, actionable AI experience in a heavily regulated industry requires a deliberate stack:
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/7a891cf6-ee7b-442e-bdd2-4c6f416df552?width=1874&amp;height=760" alt="Image" />
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Deterministic data: Your bank&rsquo;s accurate, verifiable core records</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Probabilistic AI: Generative models that bring conversational reasoning to the experience</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Open Banking Data: Aggregated external accounts (mortgages, credit cards, investments) providing complete financial context</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Auditability: Clear tracking of every decision and prompt output</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Guardrails: Safety measurements ensuring calculations and advice remain accurate</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Governance: Strict compliance controls suited for regulated environments</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Actionability: Enabling the AI to safely move money, pay bills. Manage subscriptions, and update direct deposits on behalf of the user</li>
</ol>
<h3>How MX Helps You Own the Fourth Channel</h3>
Putting all seven pillars into production doesn&rsquo;t require rebuilding your tech stack from scratch.
MX&rsquo;s new <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/financial-ai-assistant/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Financial AI Assistant</a> is powered by MX data and designed to drive growth within your platform. Combining the depth of financial intelligence and personalization with the natural flow of conversation, MX&rsquo;s Financial AI Assistant delivers:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Real-money answers in plain language: Consumers ask about their finances and get personalized guidance grounded in their real financial data.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Proven, deterministic intelligence: Answers are computed directly from permissioned user data, ensuring every recommendation is accurate and reliable, never hallucinated.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Full brand and voice control: Highly configurable guardrails keep your institution's unique voice, brand guidelines, and product recommendations in complete control.</li>
</ul>
By embedding frontier-level intelligence directly into your app, MX enables financial institutions to deliver proactive guidance, shift consumer behavior, and own the fourth channel.
<h2>What &ldquo;Agentic&rdquo; Really Means</h2>
Closing his keynote, West offered a clear definition:
<blockquote>
&ldquo;An LLM on its own is not an agent. Finance only becomes agentic when actions happen automatically and securely on the customer&rsquo;s behalf with their control.&rdquo;
</blockquote>
When a paycheck hits an account, an agentic system automatically allocates savings, clears upcoming bills, and optimizes investments according to pre-set parameters. That is the future of automated finance, and the banks that build the infrastructure for it today will own the primary customer relationships of tomorrow.

Taking the stage at Finovate 2026, MX Chief Revenue Officer Matt West opened with a direct challenge to financial institutions: the era of mobile banking primacy is ending, and the age of agentic banking has arrived.

The Fourth Channel What Finovate 2026 Taught Us About Agentic Banking

If your card isn’t serving as the primary driver for daily purchases and recurring transactions, those dollars are flowing directly to competing issuers.

Discover how to strengthen cardholder engagement, protect your portfolio’s revenue, and maintain top-of-wallet positioning.

Between credit cards, debit cards, and digital wallets, the average consumer has no shortage of options at checkout.
For financial institutions, having your card sitting in that stack is a necessary starting point, but it isn&rsquo;t the finish line. Spend doesn&rsquo;t split evenly across options. A single primary card does the vast majority of the heavy lifting, while secondary cards capture only whatever happens to be left over. When a card isn&rsquo;t top-of-wallet, it rarely triggers a dramatic account closure; instead, it quietly loses relevance until the customer relationship effectively disappears.
<h2>The Illusion of Split Loyalty</h2>
It&rsquo;s tempting to assume that consumers distribute their purchasing across different cards based on category rewards, rotating offers, or specific store perks.
Recent <a href="https://www.pymnts.com/credit-cards/2025/consumers-spend-nearly-2000-per-month-using-top-of-wallet-credit-cards-study-finds/">self-reported survey data</a> from PYMNTS Intelligence (2025) confirms just how multi-card the average consumer is:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Seventy-eight percent of cardholders carry two or more cards</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Forty-nine percent carry three or more cards</li>
</ul>
However, carrying multiple cards does not translate to split loyalty. Even among consumers with three or more cards in their wallet, 46 percent still rely on a single primary card multiple times a week.
While consumers may hold multiple pieces of plastic, their actual spending habits remain overwhelmingly concentrated around a single default option.
<h2>The Revenue Gap: $1,903 vs. $1,202</h2>
This winner-take-most dynamic translates directly into measurable bottom-line differences for financial institutions.
According to the same 2025 PYMNTS Intelligence study, a cardholder&rsquo;s primary card generates about 60 percent more revenue than their second card, capturing roughly $1,903 in average monthly spend compared to just $1,202 on the secondary option.
That ~$700 monthly gap per cardholder represents massive cumulative interchange and interest revenue left on the table whenever an institution drops from first to second place.
<h2>A Persistent Pattern Across Credit Data</h2>
This behavior isn&rsquo;t just a recent quirk of modern survey data; it reflects an entrenched pattern in how cardholders manage credit.
Historical credit bureau data confirms that this spending concentration is a long-standing structural pattern. Past analyses showed that roughly 60 percent of consumers with multiple cards put at least 70 percent of their spend onto one primary card. Payment tech and rewards programs have changed dramatically since then, but consumers continue to choose a single favorite card and only use secondary cards as backups or for occasional niche purchases.
<h2>The Stakes of Loyalty &amp; Retention</h2>
This level of spending concentration highlights why card loyalty and retention are critical to portfolio health.
A card that loses top-of-wallet status rarely fails loudly. There is usually no angry phone call to customer service or explicitly cancellation request. Instead, the card simply gets pushed deeper into the wallet or buried under newer default settings in online checkouts. Competitor rewards, introductory balance offers, and seamless digital onboarding quietly chip away at daily engagement until the card becomes completely inactive.
Securing top-of-wallet status directly dictates portfolio performance, marking the difference between a high-yield customer relationship and an underperforming asset.
<h2>Which Card Is Winning Your Consumers&rsquo; Wallets Right Now?</h2>
If your card isn&rsquo;t serving as the primary driver for daily purchases and recurring transactions, those dollars are flowing directly to competing issuers.

One Card to Rule Them All

Content Strategist

Thirty percent of consumers are already asking AI financial questions. Is your institution ready?

Become an early adopter of our Financial AI Assistant

Discover key insights from our webinar on deploying AI responsibly in banking. Learn how to break down silos, govern data, and deepen customer relationships.

AI That Drives Growth and Deepens Financial Relationships

Thirty percent of consumers are <a href="https://www.mx.com/research/financial-apps-fall-short/">already asking AI financial questions</a>. Is your institution ready?
Last week&rsquo;s webinar featured industry leaders discussing the seismic shift we&rsquo;re seeing in banking today, and the conversation boiled down to this: the institutions that have been waiting for AI adoption to become mainstream have already missed the window for first-mover advantage.
Using AI isn&rsquo;t enough. What matters is whether your institution has the governance, architecture, and data infrastructure to deploy it responsibly at scale, and in ways that measurably improve people&rsquo;s lives. Without these foundational elements, even the most sophisticated AI systems become liabilities.
Here are the top four takeaways from this week&rsquo;s webinar:
<h2>1. AI is a Relationship Builder, Not a Cost-Reduction Tool&nbsp;</h2>
Treating AI like a glorified Q&amp;A bot misses the point. Customers are already asking AI about budgeting, debt, and retirement&mdash;the things they used to talk to an advisor about. If your institution doesn&rsquo;t deliver those answers, external AI tools will disintermediate your relationship, making your FI optional. When done right, AI surfaces a customer&rsquo;s full financial picture to drive true financial wellness and build deep, long-term trust.
<h2>2. Point Solutions Create Silos</h2>
Stitching together isolated AI tools across lending, wealth management, and support leaves the customers experience disjointed and inconsistent. Real competitive advantage comes from agentic orchestration: an overarching operating system that connects everything and allows intelligence to compound across every department.
<h2>3. The Ability to Execute Matters</h2>
The gap between demo and production is where most institutions stall. Real customers bring edge cases, regulatory requirements add complexity, and the data becomes challenging. Financial institutions that succeed act decisively, setting clear parameters and aligning risk teams early rather than getting stuck in perpetual planning phases.
<h2>4. Strong Governance Lets You Move Faster, Not Slower</h2>
When financial institutions get excited and start moving too fast, they skip the governance layer and find themselves making recommendations they can&rsquo;t justify, and sometimes end up facing regulatory scrutiny and damaging their reputations. Strong data governance is what separates confident deployments from risky ones. Here&rsquo;s what that looks like:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Clean data feeding the AI</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Safeguards that prevent unsuitable recommendations before they reach customers</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Full visibility into each decision for audits, customers, and regulators</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Built-in compliance with FINRA, SEC, and other relevant standards</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Human oversight that can review, adjust, or override when needed</li>
</ul>
<h2>Our Financial AI Assistant in Action</h2>
After all the strategic discussion, we gave a demo of our new <a href="https://www.mx.com/products/financial-ai-assistant/">Financial AI Assistant</a>, now open to early adopters. Here&rsquo;s a look at what it does.
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/691d2caf-2c24-4b5e-9ff6-4b36c2ed093d?width=3728&amp;height=1614" alt="Financial AI Assistant" />
First, clarity. Instead of forcing customers to read through lengthy chat responses, our embedded, dynamic UI brings data to life visually. It breaks down spending patterns, flags hidden waste, and shows customers exactly where their money is going.
<img src="https://cms.mx.com/assets/1f9416ac-20c0-41fe-a656-02ec0990ded1?width=3730&amp;height=1500" alt="Financial AI Assisant" />
Then, action. Based on that clarity, the AI makes action effortless. No friction, no delay. Customers see the opportunity and can take action immediately, right there in the interface.
<h2>Ready to Lead?</h2>
Institutions that act now will define banking for the next decade. Those that don&rsquo;t will be responding to market leaders.
We&rsquo;re opening early access to our financial AI assistant for FIs ready to lead. Here&rsquo;s what early adopters gain:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">AI purpose-built to deepen customer relationships, not just handle inquiries</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">A proven path to production-ready AI that connects cross-product insights, driving multi-product adoption and uncovering higher-value lifetime relationships.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Immediate positioning to meet rising consumer demand early, locking in long-term trust and retention</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">A clear path to production-ready AI that drives measurable results</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://www.mx.com/products/financial-ai-assistant/#access">Become an early adopter</a>.

Using AI isn’t enough. What matters is whether your institution has the governance, architecture, and data infrastructure to deploy it responsibly at scale, and in ways that measurably improve people’s lives. Without these foundational elements, even the most sophisticated AI systems become liabilities.

ICYMI: AI That Drives Growth and Deepens Financial Relationships

MX shares recommendations for Canada’s consumer-driven banking regulations to build a secure, competitive and innovative financial ecosystem.

MX | Recommendations for Canada's CDB Regulations

The global rise of API connectivity and secure data sharing in banking marks a transformative shift in how financial services operate and deliver value. As countries around the world adopt consumer-driven banking, Canada is uniquely positioned to build a world-class framework by leveraging the lessons learned from a decade of international experience. This foundation allows us to implement best practices from the start, fostering a vibrant, secure, and truly innovative consumer-driven banking ecosystem.
For consumers, this shift promises greater control over their financial lives, enabling easier access to personalized services, improved financial wellness tools, and seamless connectivity between accounts. For the broader ecosystem, it drives meaningful innovation by breaking down data silos, allowing fintechs and financial institutions to collaborate more effectively, and fueling the development of new, competitive products that meet modern market demands.&nbsp;
The <a href="https://www.mx.com/blog/empowering-canadians/">Consumer-Driven Banking Act (CDBA)</a> is a strategic imperative for Canada&rsquo;s financial infrastructure. Beyond compliance, it represents a critical opportunity to modernize digital ecosystem stability, drive market competition, and secure Canada&rsquo;s position in the North American financial landscape. By implementing secure, interoperable API frameworks&mdash;which replace fragile legacy connections with robust, scalable infrastructure&mdash;Canada can enhance consumer mobility and ensure the financial sector remains resilient against market volatility.
<h2>Key Themes from MX&rsquo;s Submission</h2>
In our comment letter on the Department of Finance Canada&rsquo;s proposed Consumer-Driven Banking Regulations, MX shared actionable recommendations grounded in our operational history across Canada. Drawing on global insights and over a decade of experience in the market, our submission centers on three vital themes:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Prioritize Performance-Based Stability: The Bank of Canada should immediately initiate rolling accreditation reviews. Critically, legacy access methods (screen scraping) must only be phased out once mandated data providers achieve 99.5% API uptime and data completeness. Tying the transition to technical performance, rather than arbitrary dates, eliminates systemic risk and prevents consumer service disruptions.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Ensure Competitive Fairness: To drive true innovation, all accredited participants must have the right to utilize consumer-permissioned data for essential internal operations&mdash;including fraud detection, AI/ML risk modeling, and cybersecurity. Granting new entrants the same data-utilization rights as incumbents is vital for maintaining a level, competitive playing field.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Implement Proportionate Governance: Accreditation costs must scale with operational risk to ensure the ecosystem remains accessible to high-growth startups. Protecting data mobility is paramount; regulations must strictly enforce the prohibition on fees for consumer-permissioned data sharing to ensure unhindered market movement.</li>
</ul>
<h2>What comes next&nbsp;</h2>
From here, the Government will finalize the regulations, and implementation of the &ldquo;read access&rdquo; phase of the Consumer-Driven Banking framework will begin. In 2027, the Government is expected to turn their focus to the &ldquo;write access&rdquo; phase, which will be equally important for the industry and regulators to get right for the financial data ecosystem in Canada. MX is committed to partnering with Canadian regulators and industry leaders to operationalize a secure, competitive, and world-class financial future for Canadians.

Building a World-Class Consumer-Driven Banking Ecosystem: MX’s Recommendations for Canada’s Consumer-Driven Banking Regulations

Banking is won by turning AI into impact and data into trust. See the top 10 takeaways from the event.

Keep the conversation going at the Money Experience Summit this October.

Money Experience Summit 2026
July 13&ndash;15, 2026 | Sundance, Utah
The Forum brought together a diverse mix of banks, credit unions, and platform partners for two days to make one argument: the future of banking won't be won by the biggest budgets or the boldest tech &mdash; it'll be won by the institutions that turn AI into real impact and data into real trust.
&nbsp;
<ol>
<li>
Aim AI at the P&amp;L, avoid "demo-ware." Keynote speaker Muge Dogan's warning: most pilots fail because they target peripheral work. Tie every initiative to a core KPI, with even a back-of-envelope ROI, and most dead-end projects filter themselves out.
</li>
<li>
Purchasing is not adoption. Buying the tool and picking the right use case mean nothing if people don't use it. Budget as much effort for driving adoption and redesigning the process underneath as for the technology itself.
</li>
<li>
Build feedback loops, and phase in trust. When you automate a decision, let people override it &mdash; but require them to say why, then compare predictions to actuals. That loop either sharpens the model or proves the work can go hands-off.
</li>
<li>
Move technology, controls, and people together. Successful adoption isn't a technology project. It advances on three fronts at once: the systems, the governance around them, and the change management that gets teams to actually shift how they work.
</li>
<li>
Start now, and start small. Early wins build momentum; overly ambitious first projects stall. The cost of waiting exceeds the cost of starting and learning, because early movers compound their advantage.
</li>
<li>
Make it personal. Get AI-literate now, build agents that scale your own impact, and pick three concrete things to do with AI &mdash; then do them.
</li>
<li>
Trust is earned through action, not marketing. It comes from consistent, member-centric behavior over time &mdash; and privacy has to come before trust, not after.
</li>
<li>
Use data to help, not to extract. The question isn't "can we use this data?" but "how do we use it to serve people better?" People can feel the difference between being sold to and being helped.
</li>
<li>
Let mission lead; technology amplifies. As one panelist put it, technology doesn't create the vision &mdash; it amplifies the ability to accomplish it, at a scale and precision no team could reach manually.
</li>
<li>
Primacy is service, not control. Becoming a consumer's primary institution comes from genuine helpfulness and real community connection, not corporate dominance. That's what turns proactive, well-timed support into lasting loyalty.
</li>
</ol>
&nbsp;
Two days pointed to one truth: Al sets the pace, but trust keeps the lead. The institutions that start now and stay genuinely useful will own the next few years - they'll become the account those customers build their financial lives around. That's the work. Start now, and let's keep the conversation going at the Money Experience Summit this October.
&nbsp;

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