Competition, Crypto, And Crime: Financial Services And Technology Highlights From The Spring Economic Update 2026

On April 28, 2026, Canada's government tabled the Spring Economic Update 2026, titled Canada Strong For All. Building on the themes introduced in Budget 2025, the Spring Economic Update signals continued progress toward a more competitive, technology-enabled, and secure financial system.

For participants in Canada's financial services and technology sectors, the Spring Economic Update delivers a cluster of announcements spanning competition policy, digital asset regulation, financial crime enforcement, fraud prevention, artificial intelligence, and internal trade, among others.

Whole-of-Government Competition Plan: Focus on financial services

The Spring Economic Update 2026 announced the government's intention to launch a Whole-of-Government Competition Plan to ensure that competition is prioritised throughout the federal government's policies.

The plan would seek to ensure that existing and future policies across the federal government prioritize the promotion of competition and limit, to the extent possible, the potential negative impacts on competition that can, often inadvertently, stem from government policies. The plan will focus on removing inefficient government policies that impede competition arising from regulation, procurement, and industrial support.

The Minister of Finance and National Revenue is expected to provide further information on this initiative in the coming months.

Within financial services specifically, the government has stated that greater competition, innovation, and efficiency mean more options, better quality products, and more affordable financial services for Canadian consumers and businesses. Over the coming months, the government will continue to advance initiatives to promote competition and lower financial costs, helping Canadians keep more money in their pockets. This is the latest of several changes aimed at improving competition in the financial services sector, including the passage of amendments to complete the Consumer-Driven Banking Act.

Finally, the government intends to implement changes to provide more flexibility for federally regulated financial institutions to make investments that support innovative financial services and benefit the economy as a whole. The Spring Economic Update 2026 announced that the government will bring forward regulations this spring allowing federally regulated financial institutions to make a broader range of investments to improve financial services.

To support these regulations, the government proposed to amend the Bank Act to ensure the review for national security risks of investments in Canadian businesses by foreign banks and their affiliates is consistent with how other foreign investments in Canada are assessed.

Post-Stablecoin Act update

In our previous article on Budget 2025, Stablecoins, open banking, and AI: What Budget 2025 means for Canada's financial future, we discussed the government's intention to introduce legislation establishing a national framework to regulate Canadian dollar-backed stablecoins. That legislation, the Stablecoin Act, has since been passed, although we await the development of the related regulations and regulatory framework before the Stablecoin Act is expected to be proclaimed into force.

The Spring Economic Update 2026 announced the government's intention to engage with federally regulated financial institutions to better understand considerations related to their development and potential use of stablecoins, and other tokenized assets, and whether additional regulatory clarity is needed. This engagement would be complemented by targeted discussions with industry, regulators, and the provinces and territories. The focus would be on supporting innovation while maintaining financial stability, protecting consumers, including in the context of insolvency of stablecoin issuers, and preserving regulatory integrity.

As this work progresses, the government expects to outline next steps, including in Budget 2026, to inform its ongoing policy approach to stablecoins.

New federal Financial Crimes Agency

The Spring Economic Update 2026 delivers on a commitment made across many recent federal government budgets to establish a dedicated Financial Crimes Agency as Canada's lead enforcement body for complex financial crimes, including money laundering, organized criminal activity, and online financial scams. On April 27, 2026, the government introduced legislation to establish the Financial Crimes Agency.

The Financial Crimes Agency will be an independent agency, reporting to the Minister of Finance, with police powers and civilian leadership. Key features of the Agency include a mandate to investigate serious and complex financial crimes, such as money laundering, serious fraud, and major capital markets crimes, and to recover the proceeds of crime.

The Financial Crimes Agency will have the capacity to lead investigations on its own and in close cooperation with provincial, territorial, municipal, and international law enforcement partners. The Agency is also designed with the ability to attract, develop, and retain highly specialised personnel to support intelligence-led, follow-the-money investigations, including civilian and police investigators, criminal and financial intelligence personnel, and asset recovery experts, who will be supported by dedicated and specialised prosecutors.

The Spring Economic Update 2026 also announces the government's intention for the Minister of Justice to explore new criminal justice reforms to support the investigation and prosecution of complex financial crimes.

Learn more in our separate article covering the Financial Crimes Agency.

National Anti-Fraud Strategy

Budget 2025 announced the government's commitment to protect Canadians from fraud by developing a whole-of-government National Anti-Fraud Strategy to advance anti-fraud efforts across the financial and telecommunications sectors and digital platforms. According to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre, Canadians reported losing more than $704 million to fraud in 2025, bringing total reported losses since 2022 to over $2.4 billion, with only an estimated 5-to-10 per cent of consumer-targeted fraud incidents being reported.

As a first step, the government introduced new fraud-related consumer protections in the Bank Act, with the intent of making regulations by the end of 2026 to bring these changes into force. On March 30, 2026, the government launched a public consultation on the National Anti-Fraud Strategy. The consultation seeks feedback on three initial measures which could be taken to advance the strategy: to establish a comprehensive Multi-Sector Anti-Fraud Framework that strengthens market-conduct requirements for banks, telecommunication providers, and digital platforms, including social media, to prevent, detect, and respond to fraud losses when they occur, to strengthen public awareness about fraud, and to support law enforcement's ability to combat fraud.

The approach proposed in this consultation builds upon successful anti-fraud initiatives in other jurisdictions and incorporates feedback received to date from key stakeholders, including the industry-led Canadian Anti-Scam Coalition. In the next year, the government will outline additional measures to further Canada's work to combat fraud and protect Canadians.

Criminal abuse of money services businesses

Money services businesses (MSBs) are an important source of competition in the financial sector, providing services such as remittances, currency exchange, and digital payments, enhancing financial inclusion. However, the government reports that criminals are increasingly abusing MSBs to launder money, finance terrorism, evade sanctions, and defraud Canadians. In March 2026 alone, FINTRAC revoked the registration of 84 MSBs.

To support FINTRAC's efforts and protect Canadians from these crimes, the Spring Economic Update 2026 proposes to crack down on the criminal abuse of MSBs by introducing new Ministerial Directive powers to safeguard national security and the integrity of the financial system. It proposes to expand FINTRAC's ability to refuse or revoke registration of MSBs and prevent the re-registration of non-compliant MSBs.

The Spring Economic Update also proposes increasing the number of criminal record checks for MSBs, and enhancing FINTRAC's understanding of MSB risks by ensuring it has accurate and up-to-date information regarding the commencement of business and services provided by MSBs.

To protect Canadians by shutting down a primary method for scammers to defraud victims and for criminals to place their cash proceeds of crime, the Spring Economic Update 2026 proposes to ban, and make it a criminal offence to operate crypto ATMs. These measures will ensure Canadians can still benefit from the services offered by MSBs, including buying virtual currencies from brick-and-mortar MSBs, while better protecting MSBs from illicit activity.

FINTRAC formally identified the key money laundering and terrorist activity financing risks with respect to virtual currency ATMs in a May 2024 Advisory.

Artificial intelligence for all

The Spring Economic Update 2026 announces the government's vision for the much anticipated new National AI Strategy based on extensive consultations, branded "AI for All." The government reports that Canadians want AI that is safe and sovereign, and to drive AI adoption, create new economic opportunities, strengthen public services, and improve quality of life.

The government will advance these objectives through six pillars of a forthcoming AI Strategy:

1. Protecting Canadians and safeguarding our democracy: Modern privacy and online safety laws, strong national AI safety capabilities, and secure government systems.
2. Empowering Canadians: Canada becoming an AI skills nation, where AI creates good jobs and access to AI training and education for all Canadians.
3. Powering AI adoption for shared prosperity: Accelerated adoption among small- and medium-sized enterprises and transformed public service delivery.
4. Building the Canadian sovereign AI foundation: Sovereign compute infrastructure at scale—resilient, sustainable, and under Canadian governance—and growing Canada's exceptional AI researchers and talent pool.
5. Scaling Canadian champions: Unlocking growth capital and leveraging government as a strategic anchor customer.
6. Building trusted partnerships and global alliances: Working with trusted partners to align standards, co-invest in innovation, and help Canadian companies access global markets, while shaping an AI ecosystem anchored in democratic values.

Initially expected to be released in 2025, the timing of the AI Strategy’s release remains unclear.

For financial services participants, the AI for All strategy broadens and builds on Budget 2025's commitment to work with the private sector to encourage responsible AI adoption in financial services, emphasizing innovation that builds trust. The strategy's emphasis on sovereign compute infrastructure, safety frameworks, skills development and trusted partnerships, and global alliances will shape the regulatory and operational environment in which financial institutions deploy AI solutions.

Other updates

• Real-Time Rail: The government reaffirms its commitment to the future of Canada's Real-Time Rail, which is launching in 2026 as a cornerstone of its payments modernization agenda and is expected to serve as a powerful engine for national productivity and economic growth.
  The government will continue to engage with all relevant stakeholders to ensure the accelerated development of the RTR's future capabilities and is advancing payments modernization by strengthening the supervision of payment service providers and expanding their access to national payment systems.
• Fighting extortion: In February 2026, the Minister of Finance and National Revenue directed FINTRAC to prioritise resources to tackle extortion. FINTRAC has since launched a Countering Extortion Partnership with financial institutions, government, and law enforcement and has assigned dedicated liaison officers to support local law enforcement in the most affected areas.
  The Update proposes $17.9 million over four years in new funding to ensure FINTRAC can prioritise the detection, deterrence, and disruption of the illicit financing that supports extortion and fentanyl trafficking, and to advance a technology and artificial intelligence roadmap.
• Code of Conduct for the Prevention of Economic Abuse: Following extensive engagement with victims and survivors, frontline service providers, banks, consumer advocates, and experts in gender-based violence and seniors' financial protection, the government is moving into formal discussions with industry partners on the core elements of a Code of Conduct for the Prevention of Economic Abuse for banks.
  Stakeholder feedback has highlighted the need for clear bank protocols, improved staff training, stronger internal escalation pathways, and safeguards that protect client privacy and autonomy.
• Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF): CARF is a global tax transparency regime developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development to require crypto-asset service providers to collect and automatically exchange information on crypto transactions with tax authorities, similar to existing financial account reporting rules.
  Canada has committed to implement CARF, but its coming into force has been deferred, with reporting now expected to begin in 2027.
• Internal trade and labour mobility: The government proposes to continue the reduction of internal trade barriers, including by eliminating all federal exceptions to the Canadian Free Trade Agreement, implementing the Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act to require recognition of comparable provincial and territorial requirements.
  This would involve bringing into force a new Financial Services Chapter of the Canadian Free Trade Agreement to enhance transparency and certainty for provincially regulated financial services providers and working to strengthen labour mobility rules to facilitate cross-jurisdictional labour mobility.

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