Digital Coercion? The Financial Market and the Right to Digital Opt-Out between Fiction and Reality

Abstract This article examines the challenges that digitalisation poses for the regulation of contemporary financial markets and the implications for individual freedom. The financial sector demonstrates how ‘digital coercion’ can threaten the right not to use technology, raising questions about the balance between protecting citizens’ rights and enabling participation in a digitalised economy. The focus is on how technological development, especially artificial intelligence (AI), affects everyday interactions with financial systems and whether individuals still have a genuine choice to remain outside digital frameworks. The analysis relies primarily on the dogmatic-legal method, complemented by axiological reflection and critical legal perspectives, to reveal tensions between existing regulations, constitutional values and human rights. Digital coercion occurs when opting out of technology is no longer practically possible, particularly in finance where alternatives diminish as digital tools dominate. While it may be theoretically possible to avoid financial technology, doing so risks exclusion from essential functions such as accessing credit or managing finances. EU regulations like the AI Act, MiCA and DORA reinforce this process, promoting and effectively enforcing digitalisation while limiting the right to digital opt-out. Although these frameworks aim to safeguard privacy and freedom, in practice technologies and algorithms increasingly shape financial markets, often in opaque ways. In line with Lawrence Lessig’s notion that ‘code is law’, algorithms become de facto lawmakers, establishing norms that constrain free consumer choice. Consequently, the right not to use technology becomes largely illusory when access to fundamental services depends on technological infrastructure.