RBI Released Draft Directions For Non-Banking Financial Company – Account Aggregator

The Non Banking Financial Company- Account Aggregator Directions, 2016 was released by RBI on March 3, 2016 to put in place a regulatory framework to allow a separate category of Non Banking Financial Company to emerge as an Account Aggregator.

• As per the NBFC-AA Directions, RBI will supervise and regulate the activity of account aggregation and ensure the service provided conform to the prescribed standards.

Key Points:

• Only Companies registered with RBI as NBFC-AA will be allowed to carry out the business of an account aggregator.
• The net owned fund of such companies should not be less than Rs 2 crores
• The NBFC-AA will only be able to undertake the business of an Account Aggregator.
• Entities being regulated by other regulators of the Financial Sector and aggregating only the accounts in that sector need to register with RBI.
• An Account Aggregator’s business will be IT driven.
• An Account Aggregator will not support transactions in Financial Assets.
• Initially, Financial Assets of which the records are stored electronically and are under the regulation of any Regulator namely SEBI, PFRDA, RBI and IRBA will be considered for aggregation.
• As per the Directions, an investor may avail an Account Aggregator’s services purely at their option.

Account Aggregator

• They will collect information about the Financial Assets of the customers and consolidate them in an organised and retrievable manner.
• The consolidated information of a customer’s financial assets will help get an overview of his asset holdings.