National Fintech Strategy will be developed at the initiative of the National Bank. For the purpose of its successful implementation, a number of new, joint activities of financial regulators will be undertaken to provide support to financial service providers so that they can introduce and apply innovations in our financial system accordingly. In this regard, several activities have already been taken, one of which is the recently opened Innovation Hub. Through it, several companies have already contacted the National Bank regarding the development and implementation of innovations in the area of financial services and products. This was stated at the beginning of the Workshop on Financial Technologies, which is today organized by the National Bank, with the support of the European Fund for Southeast Europe (EFSE).
The workshop was opened with the welcoming speech of the Governor of the National Bank, Anita Angelovska Bezhoska. “Numerous possibilities the financial technologies enable can significantly contribute to reduce costs for the financial services users, as well as increase the efficiency and competitiveness of these services providers. It is especially important that they will enable larger spectrum of financial services thus contributing towards easier access to services by both the citizens and corporate sector. The benefits to our economy would be very significant, although fully reaping the benefits of financial innovation is not a short-term process”, she said.
The Governor emphasized that the implementation of innovations and the benefit of technological progress in the financial area can contribute towards achieving stronger dynamics of economic growth and its greater inclusiveness, thus accelerating the process of real convergence of our economy with the European one.
“For small economies, such as ours, financial innovation can also play an important role in facilitating trade integration. More appropriate and cheaper digital payment instruments can form the basis for facilitating the cross-border trade process, including for faster development of e-commerce. There is a broad consensus that small economies cannot be richer without increasing their exports and deepening their integration into international economic flows. The activities that support the development of the Fintech sector in our country will also support the acceleration of our exports and our greater integration into the international economy”, said Angelovska Bezhoska, referring also to the challenges that financial innovations bring to the financial regulators.
The workshop is led by an international expert in this area, Jay Tikam. It is attended by representatives of all regulators of our financial system. For today, it is envisaged that through an interactive collaborative group work, they will analyze several important issues the National Strategy should cover. Among other things, the workshop will focus on the implementation of international best practices in this area, including in the area of regulation and supervision. At the same time, special attention will also be paid to the determining of activities for further capacity building in our country, in order to constantly monitor the trends in the field of financial innovation and readiness to respond to the challenges, as well as to benefit the economy.
This workshop is also part of the activities that the National Bank implements in this period in accordance with the preparation of the new legislation on payment services that will create conditions for greater competition and better services for the citizens and the corporate sector in the field of payment services. Following today's event, the EFSE will support the National Bank in further activities for development of the National Fintech Strategy.
In the past period, this important Fund has supported a number of other projects in the central banking business in our country.
