More than 20 banks and fintechs in the UK have invested in a new for-profit payment company, UK Payments Initiative (UKPI), that will promote account-to-account (A2A) payments in the country under an open banking model. Shareholders in UKPI account for more than 97% of all current accounts in the country. The number of participants will soon expand to include more than a dozen fintechs. In time, merchant acquirers and payment service providers are expected to join. Annually, there are 4.90 billion direct-debit-type A2A payments in the UK. Those transactions operate on the country’s ACH...