FCA expands AI Lab, targets agentic commerce future
FCA Chief Data Officer Jessica Rusu announced an expanded AI Lab and new support for fintech firms. Speaking at IFGS, Rusu outlined plans for 'agentic commerce' and Open Finance as key to future financial services.
Agentic commerce and AI Lab expansion
Jessica Rusu highlighted 'agentic commerce' as the next profound shift, enabling intelligent systems to transact on behalf of consumers within defined guardrails.
This demands a fundamentally new approach to accountability, trust, and control in financial services.
To support this, the FCA is launching the next phase of its AI Lab, a novel environment for firms to work through technical and regulatory challenges.
This expansion includes extending its partnership with NVIDIA for more computing power and support beyond the program's end.
Furthermore, a new cohort of established firms, including Barclays, GoCardless, Experian, UBS, Palindrome, Aereve, Co-Adjute, and Lloyds/Scottish Widows, will enter AI Live Testing for wholesale and retail use cases, agentic payments, and AI applications in financial advice and credit scores.
The Supercharged Sandbox is also scaling up with NayaOne's support, with a second intake opening on 5 May 2026 to provide more UK fintechs access to data and Nvidia compute.
Open Finance and scaling fintechs
Underpinning the vision for agentic commerce is the FCA's Open Finance roadmap, published last week, which aims to provide the necessary infrastructure.
This initiative seeks to address fragmented financial lives by enabling secure digital wallets for financial data, facilitating better product and service discovery through Smart Data.
The Smart Data Accelerator will help shape this vision, ensuring readiness for agentic commerce.
Rusu also announced the opening of the Scale-Up Unit for expressions of interest from solo-regulated firms, offering practical, targeted support to help them grow, enter new markets, build resilience, and move from momentum to leadership.
The FCA emphasizes its role as a pro-innovation, tech-positive regulator, aiming to create a better environment for firms to build, launch, and scale in the UK.
Ambitious vision, practical hurdles
The FCA's ambitious vision for agentic commerce and Open Finance faces significant hurdles in data interoperability and consumer trust.
While the 'no new rules' AI policy aims for agility, it may create regulatory uncertainty for complex new technologies.
Translating these initiatives into secure, widely adopted solutions will be crucial for the UK's fintech leadership.