None of Canada’s Big Six banks is currently scheduled to join the first phase of the Real-Time Rail, the long-delayed instant payments system due to launch in the fourth quarter of 2026, BetaKit reported on Oct. 8, citing four fintech-sector sources.
The report is unconfirmed. Payments Canada, which runs the system, has declined to name its Phase 1 participants, and this story is developing.
Donna Kinoshita, Payments Canada’s chief payments officer, told BetaKit the organization is withholding the list “to protect the integrity of testing and launch.” She said every participant must meet rigorous technical, operational and security requirements, and that the phased rollout balances scalability with stability and safety.
Two of BetaKit’s sources said the rail would have little value at first without the banks, because payment volumes would be relatively low. Banks must be Payments Canada members but are not required to take part in the Real-Time Rail. Payments Canada has confirmed that both the sender and the receiver must be onboarded to move a payment over the rail. Otherwise, institutions have to use existing systems.
Royal Bank of Canada, National Bank and Scotiabank did not respond to BetaKit by press time. TD Bank, Bank of Montreal and CIBC referred questions to the Canadian Bankers Association, which did not say whether any banks will join Phase 1. The association said it supports the multi-wave approach and that the industry is engaged in payment modernization.
The Logic reported in May that Kinoshita could not confirm then whether the first wave would include all of the Big Six. It also reported that banks must be able to receive Real-Time Rail payments once they have access, but that each bank or fintech decides whether to let customers send them and when to announce it is live. Payments Canada said 1,800 payments businesses had registered with the Bank of Canada, the first step toward access.
Koho chief executive Daniel Eberhard told BetaKit he had heard banks would have “very little participation” at the start. He called a rail most Canadians cannot use “kind of performative” and questioned its value against Interac e-Transfer, particularly if Interac raises its limit to $100,000. Interac e-Transfer typically caps consumers at $3,000 and businesses at $25,000. The Real-Time Rail is designed for payments up to $100,000 with instant settlement.
Fintechs Canada called for an “adoption scorecard” to track participation, saying the real test is how much payment volume moves onto the rail and whether fintechs get fair access. Float, Wealthsimple and Koho were admitted after qualifying as payment service providers.
BetaKit reported that Interac e-Transfer clearing and settlement participants are to begin moving over in the first quarter of 2027, with another migration phase in the second quarter and full capacity in the third quarter. The Department of Finance said it will work to have all major financial institutions participating by summer 2027.
The timing matters beyond payments. The 2025 federal budget tied the mid-2027 target for open banking “write access,” which would let approved apps move money on a customer’s behalf, to the Real-Time Rail’s release and widespread use. A thin first phase could therefore affect how quickly Canadians see open banking tools.
The rail began as a 2015 project with a 2019 target before slipping to 2022, mid-2023 and now 2026. Canada is the only G7 country without an instant payment system. A 2023 C.D. Howe Institute study estimated the rail could deliver more than $3 billion in efficiency gains over its first five years.
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Sources: BetaKit (Oct. 8, 2026), The Logic (May 7, 2026).
