Why MENA is entering its Open Finance acceleration phase
By Dalal AlRayes, Co-founder & CEO at Spare
For the past few years, Open Banking in GCC has been defined by regulation, infrastructure building, and ecosystem readiness. Frameworks were introduced. Sandboxes were launched. APIs were standardised. Banks began investing in compliance infrastructure.
That foundation-building phase is now shifting. MENA is entering its Open Finance acceleration phase, where infrastructure moves from compliance-driven implementation to commercial deployment.
From regulation to activation
Across the GCC, regulators have taken deliberate steps to establish secure, consent-driven data sharing and payment initiation frameworks.
Saudi Arabia’s SAMA Regulatory Sandbox created a structured environment for Open Banking services across retail and corporate accounts.
The UAE’s AlTareq framework enables licensed Third-Party Providers to access financial data and initiate payments in a regulated manner.
Bahrain established early regulatory standards, while Kuwait’s draft Open Banking Regulatory Framework signals clear long-term direction.
Oman has introduced its Open Banking framework through the Central Bank of Oman, setting the foundation for secure data sharing and licensed third-party access.
Jordan has also issued Open Banking guidelines, with the Central Bank of Jordan outlining standards to enable regulated participation and ecosystem growth.
This first phase was necessary. Trust, interoperability, and security are non-negotiable in financial services. But regulation alone does not create transformation. Adoption does.
What has changed
From our vantage point working with banks and fintechs across the region, three shifts signal that acceleration is underway.
1. Bank readiness has materially improved
API capabilities are no longer experimental.
Consent management flows are becoming more standardised in certain markets.
Core systems are modernising to support real-time infrastructure.
Integration is becoming more predictable, and that changes commercial timelines.
2. Use cases are moving from theory to deployment
Early Open Banking conversations were conceptual. Today, businesses are actively deploying:
Real-time account-to-account payments
Automated income verification
Cash flow-based underwriting
Reconciliation
Instant account verification
The question is no longer whether Open Finance will arrive. It is how quickly organisations can operationalise it.
3. Efficiency is driving decision-making
Across global markets, cost discipline and risk optimisation are strategic priorities. Open Finance enables:
Lower-cost payment rails
Reduced fraud exposure
Cash flow visibility
Stronger affordability assessments
Faster, more compliant onboarding
In this environment, infrastructure-level improvements move from innovation projects to board-level discussions.
Payments as an inflection point
Pay by Bank is one of the clearest indicators of acceleration.
Account-to-account payments reduce reliance on card schemes, lower transaction costs, and provide real-time confirmation of funds. For industries such as trading, remittance, digital lending, and B2B payments, this represents structural optimisation rather than marginal improvement.
As more banks and licensed providers enable these flows, familiarity increases — and adoption compounds.
The regional advantage
Unlike markets where Open Finance evolved organically, MENA benefits from forward thinking regulatory direction.
Frameworks have been designed with security and interoperability at their core. This alignment between regulators, financial institutions, and licensed providers reduces fragmentation and builds long-term trust.
We are also beginning to see conversations around cross-border interoperability , a critical factor in a region characterised by remittance corridors and multi-market financial groups. Acceleration does not mean overnight disruption. It means momentum.
What comes next
In this next phase, differentiation will come from execution. Organisations that embed Open Finance into core journeys, not as an add-on, but as infrastructure, will be best positioned to scale.
The groundwork across MENA is largely in place. The shift now is from preparation to execution. The acceleration phase has begun as bank readiness, deployment and commercialisation is taking shape, enabling businesses to take financial innovation to the next level.