Clifford Chance

The Monetary Authority of Singapore announces latest plans to develop financial innovation and FinTech adoption.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has announced the launch of Sandbox Plus, an enhanced version of its FinTech Regulatory Sandbox framework, to further catalyse financial innovation and FinTech adoption.

The MAS launched the FinTech Regulatory Sandbox in 2016 to encourage and enable experimentation of technology innovation to deliver financial products and services. The Regulatory Sandbox, which is fully bespoke, was enhanced with Sandbox Express in 2019 to provide firms with a faster option for market testing in pre-defined environments.

Sandbox Plus will take effect on 1 January 2022 and includes the following three enhancements:

• expansion of eligibility criteria to include early adopters of technology innovation - currently, a company is eligible for sandbox only if no similar implementations were observed in Singapore. By expanding support beyond first movers to early adopters, the Sandbox Plus intends to provide a more conducive environment for new technology innovations to gain broader traction in Singapore, and provide more options to consumers and businesses;
• streamlined application with financial grant – first movers of technology innovation can concurrently apply to enter the Regulatory Sandbox and receive a financial grant of up to SGD 500,000 at a 50% funding level, in a single application. The grant will help meet the cashflow needs of Sandbox Plus applicants, and allow them to focus resources on technology innovation and market development even while they are still in the Regulatory Sandbox; and
• participation in Deal Fridays - eligible applicants will be enrolled in the Deal Fridays programme – a platform for deal-making opportunities. The programme intends to help sandbox companies access the external investor community, to benefit from the network, mentorship, and funding.

Separately, MAS has announced that it will launch a platform named ChekFin to further enhance industry collaboration on technology and data sharing. The platform is a partnership among the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network, BCG FinTech Control Tower, and Affinidi, with MAS as a founding partner.

ChekFin is a decentralised credentials platform intending to support partnerships between financial institutions and fintech firms thereby enabling financial institutions to obtain verified credentials of fintech firms, such as business references, awards they have obtained, and investor funding records. Subsequently, fintech firms can decide who they want to share their private credentials with.

With ten global financial institutions having signed up for ChekFin already, the platform is set to be launched in December 2021.