Wells Fargo, PNC Pushing Fintechs to Use Bank-Backed Data Firm

Wells Fargo & Co. and PNC Financial Services Group Inc. are trying to force data aggregators and fintechs to use a bank-backed firm that charges fees to access customer data, the latest salvo in a fight between traditional lenders and third-party tech firms over the US open banking system.

Wells Fargo sent a cease and desist letter to one data aggregator warning the company to stop using the bank’s corporate logo and other intellectual property on its website and demanding that it go through Akoya—the bank-backed data provider—rather than linking to Wells Fargo directly, according to multiple people familiar with the matter who requested anonymity to discuss business relationships.

Wells Fargo also quietly put pressure on at least one other financial technology company, while PNC has separately pushed to make fintechs connect to data through Akoya, the people said.

The pressure comes after JPMorgan Chase & Co. shook the open banking framework several months ago by demanding that data aggregators pay significant fees to access customer deposit and credit card accounts.

The move by JPMorgan, the largest US bank, has prompted the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to reconsider its Biden-era data-access rule mandated by Section 1033 of the Dodd-Frank Act, including a prohibition on fees.

Wells Fargo and PNC are taking a different approach, seeking to route fintech data requests through Akoya, which also counts Capital One Financial Corp. and Citigroup Inc. among its bank partners.

Akoya uses application programming interfaces to exchange bank account data, which lenders view as a safer option than screen-scraping tools that rely on customer login credentials.

But Akoya also tailors fees to a fintech’s data needs, with companies processing more than 10,000 unique connections per month paying the most. Akoya also charges some customers setup and implementation fees, according to the company’s website.

Akoya’s fees aren’t passed directly to its bank backers. Akoya didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. San Francisco-based Wells Fargo and Pittsburgh-based PNC declined to comment.

“The growing push by big banks to collect tolls on consumers’ data is a direct violation of consumers’ statutory right under Section 1033 of the Dodd-Frank Act to access and share their financial information freely and securely with trusted third parties,” Steve Boms, executive director of the Financial Data and Technology Association of North America, said in an emailed statement. “Consumers shouldn’t have to pay simply to exercise a right that Congress has already guaranteed.”

FDATA includes several data aggregators such as Plaid Inc. among its fintech members.

‘A Certain Large Bank’

Another FDATA fintech member, Trustly Inc., said in an October comment letter to the CFPB that “a certain large bank has approached Trustly under sham pretenses of trademark infringement and is using that faux legal issue to demand we connect to the bank-owned Akoya service and pay data access fees.”

That large bank was Wells Fargo, according to a person familiar with the matter, and the demand came after JPMorgan made its own push for fees.

Another large bank previously made “eerily similar” demands, Trustly—a payment and data aggregation fintech—said in its letter, urging US regulators to investigate potential antitrust violations.

PNC has frequently clashed with fintechs, including a suit it filed against Plaid in December 2020, alleging the data aggregator illegally copied the look of PNC’s login screen and misled the bank’s customers into providing Plaid with their login credentials. Plaid then used that information to connect PNC customers to third-party fintechs, the bank claimed.

The two companies reached a confidential settlement closing the case in September 2024.

Fee Fight

The Biden-era CFPB rule called on banks to let customers easily share their deposit and credit card accounts with third-party fintechs and other financial services providers.

The rule, finalized in October 2024, also barred banks and other data providers from charging access fees.

Banks sued to block the rule hours after its release, arguing that it doesn’t do enough to protect lenders from liability for data breaches and wrongly allowed fintechs to get account data without serving as fiduciaries for customers.

The lawsuit also said banks should be able to charge for data calls to offset costs for maintaining information-sharing systems.

The Trump administration initially asked a federal judge in Kentucky to vacate the rule, but the CFPB changed its position after JPMorgan told data aggregators such as Plaid and MX Technologies Inc. to pay up or lose access to customer data.

Aggregators called the fees steep and said they could threaten the existence of some smaller companies.

Plaid and JPMorgan announced a data-sharing agreement in September that includes fees, although the two companies haven’t disclosed how much Plaid will pay.

Other data aggregators are believed to be in negotiations with JPMorgan, which previously signed an agreement with Coinbase Global Inc. to directly link customers’ bank accounts with their cryptocurrency wallets and bypass the aggregators.

The Trump administration agreed to take a second look at the open banking rule after crypto companies and advocates, including Donald Trump Jr., raised alarm about the fees.