A fully-attended 9th edition of Ganado Advocates’ Annual Banking and Payments Law Seminar confirmed the importance of such events that can address the increasing regulatory and legal responsibilities being faced by banks and payment institutions to protect their customers from fraud.
The afternoon seminar hosted in collaboration with the Malta Bankers’ Association brought together over 180 key lawyers, directors, regulatory advisors and senior officers who were addressed by an impressive lineup of speakers on some of the most important developments in the industry.
In his opening address, Conrad Portanier, Partner at Ganado Advocates noted how escalating global tensions, AI and climate-related environmental risks are three of the main challenges that financial institutions including banks, need to keep tabs on.
He also referred to three major legislative areas where Malta needs to focus its urgent attention on, namely the Construction Industry, the Taxation Regime and the Legal and Judicial System as well as unresolved constitutional issues surrounding our administrative law framework given how several operators are challenging the imposition of large administrative penalties by bodies such as the FIAU and the MFSA as running contrary to the Constitution of Malta which requires criminal charges to only be heard by an independent and impartial Court.
Referring to the disproportionate way that the application of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme hit Malta and to how the EU Preventive Restructuring Directive almost damaged the Maltese shipping register permanently, Dr Portanier said: “To these legislative challenges, we add the need to implement a proper functioning EU Proposals Screening Mechanism, a role previously performed by MEUSAC – the Malta-EU Steering Action Committee.
Clearly and efforts to identify possible issues in forthcoming EU legislation must start immediately, both by increased private efforts, but also through a Government platform.”
In his address, Marcel Cassar, chairman of the Malta Bankers Association noted that whilst the banking industry is already a very dynamic one, banks are also facing challenges brought by the fast changes in payment behaviours.
“Not only has plastic replaced cash, but mobile wallets are increasingly replacing plastic. In fact, approximately one-third of online payments are made from digital/mobile wallets and with the growing number of neobanks, the inroads of fintech and bigtech into banking are now not just a threat but real, and they are redefining banking customer expectations.’
Cassar noted that in most conversations on the future of banking, the disruption by fintech and big tech of the traditional banking model is an elephant in the room and referred to as ‘ironic’ the fact that challenger banks born to escape regulation, to a large extent still operate at the fringes of regulation.
As the keynote speaker, Catherine Galea, Head of Banking Supervision at the Malta Financial Services Authority gave a detailed account of the evolving regulatory landscape as applicable to banks, highlighting in particular topics such as DORA, ESG and the new EU Banking Package. Chiara Frendo, a specialist financial services litigator at Ganado Advocates discussed legal requirements and responsibilities that make banks and financial institutions have to avoid liability in cases of customer fraud and urged all operators in the industry to ensure they are always aligned to the latest requirements as this is the only way how they can safeguard their robustness.
Participants then attended two separate breakout sessions, one led by Dr Leonard Bonello, head of fintech at Ganado, who explored the impact of the new iteration of payment laws (PSD3 and PSR) on both banks and payment institutions and the other breakout session ledby Ganado’s Dr Roberta Carabott that treated the topic “Re-evaluating lending practices: Understanding the New Consumer Credit Directive.”
This article was first published in the April issue of The Corporate Times