The European Payments Alliance (EuroPA) and the European Payments Initiative (EPI) are collaborating to facilitate seamless payment transactions for consumers across the continent.
This initiative aims to shift control of the EU’s payments ecosystem from US card schemes and tech giants, thereby enhancing the Bloc’s sovereignty in the payments landscape.
EPI recently launched its Wero digital wallet, leveraging account-to-account (A2A) payments to empower European banks in competing with Visa and Mastercard. EuroPA, which includes Italy’s Bancomat, Spain’s Bizum, and Portugal’s MB Way/Sibs, aims to enable 50 million users to send and receive money instantly to mobile phone numbers across borders. It has expanded to include Poland’s Blik, Greece’s Iris, and Nordic giant Vipps MobilePay.
Now, EuroPA and EPI are exploring a joint offering that would encompass various payment scenarios—person-to-person and commercial transactions, both online and in-store—across the involved markets.
A study is expected to conclude by the end of summer, leading to an agreement that will initially include 15 European countries, representing over 382 million inhabitants (84% of the EU population and Norway). This will allow users to continue using their preferred digital payment methods locally and across Europe.
Both organizations assert that connecting existing systems is a crucial step toward achieving European payments sovereignty and independence, a sentiment echoed by BNP Paribas COO Thierry Laborde, who emphasized that this goal is now a pressing need rather than a distant ambition.