ECB’s Cipollone sets out digital euro and payments priorities

What happened

The Eurosystem is pursuing a comprehensive upgrade of European money and payments, ECB Executive Board member Piero Cipollone said in a keynote speech in Tirana on 5 November.

Speaking at the eighth International Conference of Regional Card Schemes and Retail Financial Market Infrastructures, Cipollone identified four initiatives: modernising euro banknotes, developing a digital euro, enabling tokenised asset transactions to settle in central bank money, and interlinking fast payment systems.

He said the Eurosystem’s payments strategy aims to preserve central bank money’s role in retail and wholesale settlement, strengthen European resilience and strategic autonomy, support an integrated payments market and bolster the euro’s international role.

Why it matters

Cipollone said digital payments remain fragmented across national markets and uses, while 13 euro area countries depend entirely on non-European companies for in-store card payments.

A digital euro would provide a digital form of cash available and accepted throughout the euro area, he said. It would complement banknotes and coins rather than replace them.

For private payment providers and financial infrastructure operators, the speech sets out the Eurosystem’s intended role: providing a trusted public foundation for innovation, rather than replacing the private sector or choosing which technology should prevail.

Cipollone also pointed to progress in the Western Balkans. According to the speech, a clone of the Eurosystem’s TIPS fast payment system, developed by Banca d’Italia, is operational in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro. Launches in Albania, Kosovo and North Macedonia are expected soon. The system supports round-the-clock, real-time domestic transactions in local currencies at low cost.

Context / What to watch

Cipollone said negotiations between EU institutions are under way on the Single Currency Package, covering proposed regulations for a digital euro and the legal tender status of euro cash. The European Parliament and Council have adopted their respective positions.

Cash modernisation is proceeding alongside digital work. The ECB’s Governing Council expects to choose the final design concept for new euro banknotes around the end of 2026. They should enter circulation gradually from the early 2030s, with existing banknotes remaining valid.