Financial firms across Europe have bumped up their budgets for open banking, new sector analysis has revealed, despite previous research showing the data sharing technology could lead to a potential decline in revenue.

Open Banking refers to the public sharing of the data and account information that banks hold on their customers. It helps competitors, such as fintech firms offering consumer money-management apps, to build and market their services. Since the start of 2018, the UK’s nine largest banks — led by HSBC, Barclays, RBS, Lloyds and Santander — have been obliged to provide this data to start-ups licensed under the FCA’s Open Banking programme.