The Central Asia FinTech Association proposed four priority areas for harmonizing the region's financial markets: payment interoperability, mutual recognition of digital identification, compatible open banking standards, and common data governance principles. These proposals were presented during a session at the Silk Road Finance and Technology Forum held in Tashkent on August 25th.
The session, titled 'Building an Open Ecosystem — Corridors, Capital, and Rules Connecting Markets,' was moderated by Chek-Chun Fu, Director of Regulation and Policy at the Global Network of Finance and Technology. The discussion focused on three components of an open financial architecture: payment infrastructure, or 'corridors,' regulatory norms, and capital.
Husanhodja Abidov, Director of Strategy, Transformation, and Project Management at the Central Bank of Uzbekistan, noted that none of these three elements can function in isolation. He defined interoperability—the ability to connect markets, data, and infrastructure across countries—as the region's primary constraint.
According to Abidov, the Central Bank intends to first allow innovations to develop and then introduce regulation proportional to the growth of risks and scale, rather than predetermining which business model will dominate. He emphasized that the success of open finance in Uzbekistan should be measured not by the number of created application programming interfaces, but by whether consumers and businesses gain access to cheaper and higher-quality financial products.
Roman Tretyakov, Deputy Chairman of the Board for IT and Digital Transformation at Octobank, stated that the bank plans to operate under a 'banking as a service' model, providing partners access to its services and APIs. Acknowledging the complexity of data exchange with partners due to personal data protection and security requirements, he added that the bank is collaborating with the Central Bank to ensure the security of open data exchange.
Akhmet Kayhan, Group Director of Payments and Digital Assets at VEON, stated that the telecommunications group serves over 220 million customers in five countries, including Uzbekistan. He noted that VEON already provides financial services through its telecom infrastructure in areas where banks often find it unprofitable to serve clients from remote or low-income segments. In Kayhan's view, embedded finance is already developing around this infrastructure through retail points and entrepreneurs who effectively act as mini-banks.
Madhusudkhan R., co-founder of M2P Fintech, opined that when choosing between building proprietary infrastructure and purchasing ready-made solutions, banks usually focus on two aspects: transparent consent-based data management and promoting financial inclusion. Comparing regulatory approaches in different regions, he observed that strict regulation in Europe hinders innovation, whereas regulators in some Asian countries establish principles allowing private companies to build solutions on top of open public infrastructure.
Otabek Nasirov, Chairman of the Central Asia FinTech Association, stated that the region does not need to adopt identical laws or build the same systems in all five countries. Instead, he proposed focusing on payment interoperability, including QR payments and faster, cheaper cross-border transfers; mutual recognition of digital identification and electronic remote identity verification; compatibility of open banking API standards; and common principles for cross-border data governance. His goal is not to create a single regional regulator, but to develop mutually recognized standards and interoperable infrastructure capable of connecting the markets of five countries with a total population of over 80 million people.
Stefan Klestil, Partner at the venture fund Speedinvest, mentioned that the fund has supported seven unicorn companies in emerging markets, including a recently announced Dubai fintech unicorn. He noted that the fund primarily focuses on the quality of founders rather than market size. Klestil sees strong technological potential in Uzbekistan, as well as a significant diaspora of specialists abroad. For him, the key indicator of success will be the return of top specialists home to start businesses in Uzbekistan, rather than in Silicon Valley.