On 16 July, the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht or BaFin) published its new report “Big data meets artificial intelligence – Challenges and implications for the supervision and regulation of financial services”.

The report, which was created in conjunction with Partnerschaft Deutschland, the Fraunhofer Institute and The Boston Consulting Group, aims to initiate a discussion on the impact of digitalization on established market and supervisory structures.

The report uses both market analyses and use cases to outline potential developments as seen from the perspective of banks, insurance companies and capital markets but also takes consumer concerns into account. Likewise it addresses the work of supervisory and regulatory authorities including their tools and instruments of regulation in light of technological progress.

In addition to a detailed analysis, the report also contains a series of supervisory and regulatory key questions that will guide BaFin’s FinTech work in the future. To receive industry input, BaFin opened a dedicated stakeholder consultation on these key questions. Comments can be submitted by 30 September 2018.