The European Central Bank (ECB) has published a speech given by Executive Board Member Yves Mersch. The speech is entitled Rencontres du Club SEPA.

In his speech Mr Mersch discusses: instant payments – a tool for innovation in payments, instant point-of-sale payments, e-commerce, PSD2 and security and instant payments versus virtual currencies.

When discussing instant payments – a tool for innovation in payments Mr Mersch states, among other things, that the TARGET instant payment settlement service is scheduled to go live in November 2018, ensuring the pan-European reach of instant payments – which has been one of the main objectives of the Euro Retail Payments Board. He also states that a service that will allow people around Europe to make mobile payments to others, using their mobile phone number as an identifier, is expected to be available by October 2018.

When discussing PSD2 and security Mr Mersch states that the PSD2 regulatory technical standards on strong customer authentication and common and secure communication will probably not be applicable until September 2019 at the earliest. However, since the main provisions of the PSD2 have been in effect since January 2018, Mr Mersche calls on payment service providers to fulfil the requirements of the RTS, even though they are not yet legally required to do so, during the transition period until the standards enter into force.

View Rencontres du Club SEPA, 15 February 2018