Digital Payments & Fintech · Taiwan
Fintech & digital payments rules in Taiwan (2026)
Taiwan shaded by its digital payments & fintech status
Taiwan operates a well-established two-tier electronic payments licensing regime under the Act Governing Electronic Payment Institutions (EPI Act), comprehensively overhauled in 2021 to unify e-payments and stored-value cards under one law. Specialized Electronic Payment Institutions (EPIs) require FSC approval; as of 2025 there are 29 licensed EPIs (9 specialist non-bank institutions and 20 banks). Smaller operators collecting payments below a TWD 2 billion funds threshold are classified as Third-Party Payment Service Providers and must complete AML and service-capability registration with the Ministry of Digital Affairs under rules in force since November 2024.
Key points
Effective 1 July 2021, the amended EPI Act consolidated electronic payments and electronically stored-value cards into a single unified framework, repealing the separate Act Governing Issuance of Electronic Stored Value Cards. Licensed core businesses now include agent payment collection, stored-value fund acceptance, small-amount domestic and cross-border remittances, and related foreign-exchange services.
Operators exceeding the TWD 2 billion funds threshold must obtain FSC approval as a Specialized EPI; 29 EPIs are currently licensed (9 non-bank specialists including iPASS Money and JKOPay, plus 20 banks). Below that threshold, businesses register as Third-Party Payment Service Providers under the Ministry of Digital Affairs' AML and service-capability registration regime, which came into force on 30 November 2024.
The FSC adopted a three-phase open banking rollout: Phase I (public product data, 2019), Phase II (customer data), and Phase III (transaction data, January 2024) are all in place. Phase III enables third-party service providers (TSPs), with customer consent, to initiate debits, payments, and remittances directly from bank accounts via standardised open APIs.
The Financial Information Service Co. (FISC) introduced TWQR in 2023 as Taiwan's national common QR code payment standard, enabling interoperability across e-wallet providers including JKOPay and iPASS Money. The FSC has set a target of 8 billion non-cash payment transactions by 2026.
BNPL services currently operate in a regulatory gray area; dedicated platforms avoid characterising their services as lending or credit. The FSC informed the Legislative Yuan's Finance Committee that it would issue BNPL regulatory guidelines focusing on risk management, consumer protection, and user education, but as of May 2026 a formal dedicated BNPL statutory framework has not been enacted.
In January 2025 the FSC established a new Financial Market Development and Innovation Division to advance fintech development. Taiwan's Financial Technology Development and Innovative Experimentation Act (sandbox law) allows firms to test regulated fintech services with regulatory relief for up to three years, supporting iterative licensing pathways for novel payment models.
Timeline - major decisions & events
The FSC's Banking Bureau issued binding rules requiring banks, electronic payment institutions, and virtual asset service providers to operate real-time joint-defense mechanisms, peer-notification systems, and account-suspension procedures to deter fraudulent misuse of payment channels. The regulations operationalize the 2024 Fraud Crime Hazard Prevention Act for the financial and crypto sectors.
Banking Bureau, FSC ↗Taiwan enacted a cross-sector anti-fraud statute imposing mandatory fraud-prevention obligations on financial institutions, electronic payment operators, virtual asset service providers, telecom companies, online advertising platforms, and e-commerce operators — the first law to formally bring third-party payment service providers under a statutory anti-fraud duty.
Laws & Regulations Database of the ROC (Taiwan) ↗Amendments effective 1 March 2023 expanded FSC supervisory tools: the regulator may now impose tailored sanctions, mandate additional capital provisioning, and designate industry-counseling bodies for payment institutions with operational deficiencies — strengthening enforcement without restructuring the 2021 unified framework.
FSC Law Database ↗The FSC approved seven banks (including CTBC, Mega International, Cathay United, and First Commercial Bank) to participate in Phase 2 of Taiwan's three-stage open banking programme, deploying 18 APIs for customer-information inquiries and low-risk service applications, moving beyond Phase 1's public-only data.
Regulation Asia ↗Taiwan launched the first stage of its three-phase open banking initiative, publishing standardized APIs for inquiry of publicly available financial information (credit-card rates, mortgage rates, fund data). The FSC tasked the Bankers Association and Financial Information Service Company (FISC) to govern technical standards and cybersecurity.
Taiwan Open Government Data Platform ↗The FSC approved establishment of LINE Financial Taiwan, Rakuten International Commercial Bank, and Next Commercial Bank — Taiwan's first internet-only banking licenses — opening branchless, digital-native banking to non-traditional financial entrants and marking the most significant liberalization of retail banking entry barriers in a generation.
Financial Supervisory Commission ↗Taiwan's first statute specifically governing stored-value payment cards established a licensing and oversight regime for card issuers, forming one pillar of the pre-2021 dual-track regulatory framework. The law was in force for over a decade before being repealed when the 2021 unified EPI Act consolidated both payment regimes.
Laws & Regulations Database of the ROC (Taiwan) ↗Taiwan - other topics
Last verified 5/24/2026 · Orientation, not legal advice - verify against the primary sources linked above. Explore the full world map →