The big picture: The financial world just entered a new era. Open banking rules are giving consumers control over their data, forcing banks and fintechs into a high-stakes competition to become the hub for personal finance.

Key takeaways:

  • Fintechs are UX-first companies—and now they have deeper access to financial data.
  • Traditional banks must modernize or risk losing relevance.
  • The new financial battleground is all about controlling the customer experience.
  • The winners will be those who master human-centered design.
  • Human-centered design goes well beneath the surface into the architecture that affects the end experience.

🎧 Listen to the Humans First episode featuring Lee Wetherington from Jack Henry to hear the whole conversation.

A Financial Shift with Huge Implications

For years, banks controlled consumer financial data, but a major shift is underway. The new open banking rule—Section 1033 of the Dodd-Frank Act from the CFPB—puts consumers in charge, allowing them to share their financial information as they choose. This regulatory shift is sparking intense competition between traditional banks and fintech companies, both racing to become the primary hub for financial management.

As Lee Wetherington, Senior Director of Corporate Strategy at Jack Henry, explains:

“This inaugurates a new era in which consumers are literally the owners of their financial data, can permission that data to be shared with whomever they want, for whatever purpose they like—that includes fintechs, but it also includes companies that are not fintechs. We are now officially in a new era of data wars.”

In this episode of Humans First, we talk with Wetherington about why fintechs are really UX companies, how banks can fight back, and what this all means for the future of financial services.

Fintechs: The UX-First Players Entering a New Era

Fintechs have traditionally focused on enhancing user experience (UX) while relying on traditional banks for core financial functions like payments, deposits, and lending. However, as financial data becomes more accessible, fintechs are gaining opportunities to offer deeper, more integrated services.

This explosion of new financial services has also increased what Wetherington calls “Financial Fragmentation”—where consumers juggle multiple apps, accounts, and platforms. Now, fintechs have a chance to consolidate and centralize financial management, potentially becoming the single hub for a consumer’s financial life.

Yet, challenges remain. As Wetherington puts it:

“ [Fintechs] still have to be proactive in these data wars, plumb into open banking rails, bring fragmented data back to the bank or back to the credit union, and then what they do with that data in terms of UX and design is going to make or break whether they win—not just the data wars—but whether they win over and against other chartered financial institutions that they’re also always competing against.”

Traditional Banks: Evolve or Get Left Behind

Banks and credit unions—especially smaller institutions—have long struggled with outdated infrastructure and regulatory constraints. Now, with open banking accelerating competition, they must rethink their data strategy, customer experience, and technology stack to remain competitive.

Read: The Best Customer Experiences Have These 3 Qualities

Key Challenges for Banks:

  • Aging core systems that slow down innovation
  • Delayed compliance timelines—smaller institutions have until 2030, but waiting may cost them market relevance
  • Competing against fintechs that move faster and focus on UX

Despite the challenges, banks still hold a critical advantage: data. However, as Wetherington warns:

“Is this rule going to give the golden key to fintechs to have everything that is sitting inside of a bank or credit union’s core system? Not even close. This is why I see this being both a wake-up call, but also a very clear and conspicuous opportunity for the entities that have most of the relevant data already on hand…to create more value.”

He further explains:

“ If you’re a smaller financial institution, you think, ‘I’ve got till 2030 [to comply with these regulations],’ but what’s going to happen between now and then is you’re not engaged in these data wars among all these providers to become the hub of all things financial for a given consumer and a given business.”

Banks that act now—by integrating open banking APIs, improving UX, and leveraging AI—have a unique opportunity to outpace fintechs rather than just react to them.

The Future: A User-Centered, AI-Driven Experience

The next frontier in financial services is AI-powered, personalized money management. The institutions that can provide real-time, predictive, and seamless experiences will emerge as industry leaders.

Wetherington predicts:

“Now we’re going to see who’s going to be able to defragment the experience of money in the United States such that it’s simplified, it feels better, it instills financial competence, and it now gives clarity—maybe even predictive suggestions—about what to do next and how to do better, because you have the ability now to finally get a complete 360º view of a single person’s money in one place.”

With AI and secure, standardized APIs, banks and fintechs can finally offer:

  • Personalized financial insights
  • Automated money management recommendations
  • Faster, seamless digital experiences

And the biggest opportunity? Becoming the go-to financial hub that consumers trust.

“The winners of those wars, I think, are going to be the ones who are best and most mature in their human-centered design.”

Read: Shifting Our Focus Back to the User

Building an Infrastructure for the Future

To keep up with fintech disruption and regulatory changes, banks need modern, scalable infrastructure—something Jack Henry is actively building.

Jack Henry’s approach to banking modernization:

  • Cloud-based, component-driven architecture for flexibility
  • Incremental migration instead of disruptive “rip-and-replace” core conversions
  • Improved UX and AI-driven insights to help financial institutions retain customers

Wetherington explains:

“ We’re basically rebuilding the entire tech stack on which banks and credit unions operate in a modern, public cloud, component-based architecture.”

Rather than forcing banks to overhaul their entire system at once, Jack Henry enables gradual upgrades, reducing risk and making next-gen banking technology accessible to regional and community institutions.

Kurt Vander Wiel, partner at Visual Logic, sums up the impact:

“ The real potential here is that the community financial institution can leapfrog across and be actually out in front of—instead of just trying to catch up to—the things that the fintechs can do. They can become innovative and they will have the new born power to do it in a way that the fintechs don’t even share.”

Visual Logic has been deeply involved in this transformation, helping regional banks and credit unions rethink their UX strategy, technology, and operational processes to thrive in this new era.

Listen: How design goes beyond visuals to uncover underlying human problems

Final Thoughts

The data wars in banking have officially begun. With open banking regulations unlocking new opportunities, banks and fintechs must decide:

🚀 Lead with innovation, or get left behind.

Jack Henry and Visual Logic are helping financial institutions modernize, embrace human-centered design, and prepare for the future of AI-driven banking experiences.

🎧 Listen to the full episode of Humans First now to hear the full discussion.