AI & Lending

For the first time in its history, Payments Canada has admitted non-bank financial technology companies as members. If that sentence doesn’t make you sit up a little straighter, consider this: the organization processes more than $411 billion every single business day, and it just opened its doors to companies that move faster, build leaner, and think differently about how money should work.

When Canada's banking regulator starts publishing a bulletin called "The Ledger" with its own ISSN number, you know things are getting serious. OSFI's first issue, released January 19, 2026, marks the official starting gun for the implementation phase of the Data Collection Modernization initiative. And while "data collection modernization" ranks somewhere between "drainage infrastructure" and "HVAC maintenance" on the excitement scale, the implications for Canadian banking are genuinely transformative.

The Competition Bureau just told Canadians they're leaving billions on the table because moving their data feels like moving apartments. And honestly? They're not wrong.

The maximum fine for failing to report suspicious mortgage activity just jumped from half a million to twenty million dollars. That is not a typo. Welcome to the new reality of Canadian mortgage lending compliance.

Somewhere right now, a Canadian with seven-figure digital assets is opening a bank account in Zurich. It's not tax evasion. It's impatience.