On 9 July 2018, the European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary affairs published a study, Competition issues in the Area of Financial Technology (FinTech). The study focuses on analysing potential anti-competitive factors and their impact both in the FinTech ecosystem and in concrete services.

In lieu of any consensus, the study proposes FinTech services are classified by the following categories. Each category is coupled with its respective competition concern:

• banking – deposits and lending. A lack of clear regulatory standards risks inhibiting the development of a competitive market;
• payments, transfers and Forex. Concerns that could lead to diminishing competition in the provision of payment services include access to critical assets such as data and mobile near field communication chips, and the use of an incumbency position gained offline to engage in exclusionary conduct towards competitors;
• digital currencies. The standardisation of distributed ledger technology may result in private or public consortia agreements that impact current costs or affect market entry;
• personal finance. Competition issues regarding digital personal finance management services arise mainly in the field of customer data access;
• InsurTech. The standardisation of private blockchains might create barriers of entry if the standardisation process lacks the required transparency; and
• enabling technologies and infrastructures. There are some specific niches of cybersecurity technologies where market concentration and potential competition concerns might occur, however the overall conclusion is that no specific competition concerns arise in enabling technologies.