On March 12, the Colombian Financial Regulation Unit (URF, for its acronym in Spanish) released its “Regulatory Agenda in a Technological Context” for 2020. The document sets out the entity’s guidelines on regulatory sandbox development, the low-value payment system regulation, strengthening open banking and a report drafted by the National Council for Economic and Social Policy (CONPES, in Spanish) concerning financial inclusion and education measures. The agenda will be used by the Executive branch to guide action in the sector in the short and medium term.

Key points of the Agenda include: 

• To finalize the draft decree updating regulations for the low-value payment system, which was shared for public consultation in December 2019.

• To finalize the regulatory process for the draft decree on the governance and promotion of the regulatory sandbox. The public consultation on this document was launched in February this year.

• With regard to Open Banking, where the most recent regulation is Decree 222, the entity intends to review international experiences, identify benefits for the financial consumer and monitor its impact on competition in the financial sector.

• The URF believes it is crucial to issue a CONPES document to encourage financial inclusion and education. The aim is to expand the supply of financial products and services, create greater skills, knowledge and confidence in the system and strengthen the financial and digital infrastructure.

• On issuing a CONPES document to regulate VAT refunds, URF considers this beneficial and commensurate with its agenda to strengthen the digital ecosystem. URF predicts this will lead to nearly five million payments being made directly to users by 2022, which will reduce costs and allow resources to be redirected when new policies are designed.

In addition, on March 6, the Colombian Financial Superintendency (SFC, for its acronym in Spanish) published a circular and a technical document modifying the mechanism for valuing securities issued by private equity funds. The SFC establishes that during the six months following the date when a security is transferred to the Stock Exchange variable income negotiation system, entities with investments in this security may adjust its value according to the price changes occurring in such period. This regulation is already in force.