To combat inertia among consumers, the report said banks should be forced to provide their rivals access to details such as a customer's transaction history, account balances, credit card use and mortgage repayments. Such data could be securely shared through what are known as IT "application programming interfaces". It said this could make it easier for consumers to compare products, while also giving smaller lenders more credit information about customers. Mr Medcraft said the policy recommendation was a matter for government, but APIs were the "right thing to focus on". "I was in Singapore last week and the constant feedback from fintechs was we've got to have access to the APIs." Mr Medcraft also highlighted overseas experience when asked about another recommendation of the inquiry – for regulators to review the barriers to becoming a bank in Australia. While not endorsing this recommendation, Mr Medcraft pointed to Britain's experience, where capital requirements for new banks were slashed several years ago. Unlike Australia, Britain also allows one person to own a bank. Here, no shareholder can own more than 15 per cent of an institution authorised to take deposits. "If you look for example at the United Kingdom, there's been many, many new banking licences created in the last five years," Mr Medcraft said. One of the most controversial recommendations of the banking inquiry was to force banks to name and shame responsible executives. Mr Medcraft said individual accountability had been lacking among banks in their response to the series of scandals in recent years. Treasurer Scott Morrison last week described the banking inquiry's recommendations as "very constructive" and "very practical".
The chairman of ASIC (the Australian Securities and Investments Commission), Greg Medcraft, has backed the government's banking inquiry into whether banks should provide each other “open access” to key customer data to boost competition and lower barriers to banking. However, he also noted that the policy was for the government to focus on, and that he was unsure whether the Australian Securities and Investments Commission is the right body to enforce a data-sharing regime.