Payments in Europe: towards a new strategic architecture
The European Central Bank (ECB), through the Eurosystem, has set out its new comprehensive payment strategy, positioning payments as a key pillar for Europe’s competitiveness, innovation and strategic autonomy. In the context of rapid digitalization and increasing reliance on non-European providers, the strategy adopts a holistic approach that combines the enhancement of existing infrastructures with the development of new solutions, aiming to build a more resilient, integrated and competitive European payments ecosystem.
Key highlights
- Payments as a strategic sector: The Eurosystem places payments at the core of Europe’s economic agenda, linking them directly to competitiveness, innovation, resilience and strategic autonomy. Europe’s strong dependence on non-European providers, particularly in digital payments, is identified as a key vulnerability that needs to be addressed. According to the report Efficient, secure and integrated euro payment systems can play a supportive role in reinforcing the international role of the euro. This would bring tangible benefits, including lowering borrowing costs, reducing exposure to currency fluctuations and providing insulation from sanctions and coercive measures.
- A stronger role for the ECB: The institution emerges as a central actor in shaping the payments ecosystem, not only as an infrastructure provider but also as a standard-setter, market coordinator and catalyst for both public and private solutions.
- The digital euro as a structural pillar: The digital euro is a key instrument to strengthen monetary sovereignty, resilience and market integration. It is designed to complement pan-European private solutions—such as EPI or EuroPA—while supporting common standards and synergies across the ecosystem. In October 2025, the Governing Council decided to move the project to its next phase, in order to be ready to issue the digital euro in 2029, subject to co-legislators adopting the Regulation on the establishment of the digital euro in 2026.
- Promoting EU-governed solutions: The strategy prioritises the development of EU-governed solutions, both in retail payments and in digital assets. This includes euro-denominated stablecoins aligned with the European regulatory framework, aimed at reinforcing autonomy and reducing external dependencies. Innovation, particularly tokenisation and new infrastructures, is to be developed while preserving central bank money as the anchor of the system.
- Advancing DLT-based wholesale infrastructures: The Eurosystem is investing in distributed ledger technology for wholesale payments and asset settlement, through initiatives such as Pontes and Appia, integrating central bank money into new technological environments.
- Standardisation and automation of corporate payments: A stronger focus is placed on B2B payments, promoting greater standardisation, automation and process integration, including conditional payments, to enhance efficiency for European businesses.
- Operational resilience and security: The strategy emphasises the need to strengthen operational resilience, including fallback solutions, enhanced security and closer cooperation to combat payment fraud.
- Improving cross-border payments: Advancing cross-border payments is a key priority, through infrastructure improvements and the interlinking of instant payment systems (such as TIPS), in line with the G20 roadmap for faster, cheaper and more transparent global payments.
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