Introduction
The FinLync Corporate Bank API Power Rankings Report is an annual review of the best banks in corporate API technology. The report is designed specifically to assist corporate treasury professionals with “shopping” for the banks that offer the best APIs. FinLync, as the authority in bank APIs for corporate treasury and finance, is best positioned to assess the performance and quality of bank APIs available today.
Treasury’s Guide to the Best Corporate Bank APIs
As the corporate finance industry actively advances to bank API connectivity, legacy bank connectivity methods like host-to-host and SWIFT will soon be rendered obsolete.
But not all bank APIs are created equal.
Much like JD Power recommendations when purchasing a car, FinLync has done the in-the-trenches work for treasury practitioners. Instead of having to evaluate each bank’s unique API offerings, the report offers treasury teams a cheat sheet to knowing which commercial bank APIs are the best today.
Financial institutions realize that the quality of their bank APIs is a differentiator, especially when it comes to winning RFPs. The smartest banks have a clear API strategy – whether to capture an as-yet untapped market for a more “exotic” type of API, or to be the best in the 4 core offerings of balances, transactions, payment initiation and payment status.
Power Rankings Criteria
The bank API subject-matter experts at FinLync reviewed more than 100 unique bank APIs from banks around the world. From boutique regional banks to large international financial institutions were evaluated based on the following criteria:
- Data depth
- Documentation
- Security
- Development and Testing
The Winners: Overall and By Category
The Power Rankings report crowned three banks as 2022’s Top Banks for APIs Overall: HSBC, Wells Fargo and Standard Chartered. A detailed analysis of why FinLync’s experts – those on the front lines doing the difficult work of connecting to these bank APIs – identified these three banks as this year’s best offerings.
The report also recognizes the best banks based on the type of API. Not surprisingly, the Overall Winners dominate the Category Winners, but with some surprising appearances from lesser-known contenders as well.
- Balances: Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, HSBC, Wells Fargo, USBank, Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, DBS
- Transactions: HSBC, JP Morgan Chase, Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, PNC, Raiffeisen Bank International
- Payment Initiation: Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, USBank, HSBC, Citibank, Standard Chartered, DBS
- Payment Status: HSBC, Wells Fargo, Standard Chartered, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Raiffeisen Bank International
The full report also includes a market analysis of where we are in the maturity of bank API offerings, an explainer between Open Banking APIs and the Premium Bank APIs used by corporates, and a timeline of bank connectivity sure to evoke nostalgia among those who used now-defunct technology like the telex. For those not yet acquainted with the fundamentals of wholesale banking APIs, the report includes a section on the basics of the 4 core types of bank APIs: balances, transactions, payment initiation and payment status.
The FinLync Corporate Bank API Power Rankings Report is sure to grow each coming year as financial institutions improve and expand their API offerings.