Piero Cipollone, a member of the executive board of the European Central Bank (ECB), has called on the payments sector to redouble its efforts to create a single market for small euro transactions.
Speaking at a conference in Frankfurt this Wednesday, Cipollone explained that the retail payments ecosystem is currently facing three major challenges.
Firstly, retail payments remain fragmented and there is no eurozone-wide solution, leaving citizens dependent on very few alternatives.
In addition, competition is limited due to the fact that local payment service providers find it difficult to achieve European scale, and citizens are too dependent on foreign operators.
“Over-reliance on non-European service providers makes our financial and payments system more vulnerable to external shocks,” said Cipollone, who believes European alternatives will improve the EU’s ability to set its own standards.
“Europeans must have more control over an asset as important to our economy and society as payments,” he continued.
He explained that the ECB is working to create a system in which retail payments become faster, cheaper, simpler and more sustainable through a variety of pan-European payment methods that use local infrastructure.
As he explained, the ECB is working to create a system in which retail payments become faster, cheaper, simpler and more sustainable through a variety of pan-European payment methods using existing infrastructure.
In particular, the ECB is focusing on the digital euro, which is in its preparatory stages, and the retail payments strategy, with the aim of introducing pan-European solutions for private payments at touchpoints.
In this context, Cipollone urged to avoid the temptation to maintain the “status quo” and to take advantage of the knowledge, experience and joint efforts of public authorities and private intermediaries to create a single space for retail payments in euros, the medium- and long-term immediate benefits “will far exceed the costs of the initial investment” .
“Today we need to take the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) to the next level, at the point of interaction, through a digital euro and pan-European private payments solutions,” he said.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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