The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau this week issued a final rule to define larger players in the market of “general-use digital consumer payment applications.” Under the rule, the bureau institutes supervisory authority over large nonbank payment app providers to assess their compliance with consumer financial laws. This covers apps that are used for consumers’ general use in making consumer payments transactions for payments to others for personal, household, or family purposes. These apps are more commonly known as digital wallets, payment apps, funds transfer apps, peer-to-peer payment apps, person-to-person payment apps, and P2P apps. The rule – the CFPB’s supervisory authority – will apply to nonbank providers that provide these payment apps with an annual volume of at least 50 million consumer payment transactions and are not a small business concern based on Small Business Administration (SBA) size standards.
The rule will go into effect 30 days after its published in the Federal Register.
