THE’digital euro will enter the phase of test in the second half of 2027, with the first real payments expected within 12 months. He confirms it Piero Cipollonemember of the Executive Committee of the ECB, who specifies that the instrument will support cash without replacing it. The same safety standards will be maintained and there will be no costs for citizens, while the official debut is set for 2029, after the final approval of the European regulation by the end of the year.
The pilot project: 36 PSPs, 8 Italian
The ECB has selected 36 payment service providers to participate in the pilot project, which will last 12 months. Italy is the most represented country with eight operators: UniCredit, Montepaschi, Sella Bank, Italian Post Office, isybank (Intesa Sanpaolo), Nexi Payments, Numia And Satispay. Germany will involve five, Greece and Portugal three each, the other countries one or two.
The tests will not concern citizens directly, but between 5,000 and 10,000 employees of national central banks and the ECB, on a voluntary basis. They will be able to make real payments in physical stores, e-commerce, peer-to-peer transfers and offline transactions. All these operations can be carried out via a beta version of the digital wallet.
The Eurosystem will cover the costs of the basic infrastructure, without applying system or processing fees. Banks and PSPs will instead be remunerated for the additional services offered to customers. For small merchants, according to Cipollone, costs could be halved compared to current electronic payment solutions.
Confcommercio and trade associations they ask for zero commissions on micropayments, integration into existing POS and no additional investment for merchants. The ability to make offline payments in the event of network failures is also required.
Before the issuance, in any case, the regulatory green light is needed: the negotiations on the regulation of the digital euro between Parliament, Council and European Commission they should be completed by the end of 2026. Only after final approval will the ECB be able to formally decide on the issue, which requires at least two years of preparation.
The ECB has already published a call for expressions of interest addressed to merchants in July e-commerce And m-commercewith the deadline for applications set for 27 October. A second call, aimed at private businesses and organizations to evaluate innovative use cases, expires on November 9.
At the end of July the ECB announced the start of usability and accessibility tests as part of the 2027 pilot project. The digital euro app will be designed to go beyond the minimum requirements of European accessibility legislation and will also be guaranteed to be used by people with disabilities. The ECB estimates that around 4 million Europeans without bank accounts will be able to benefit from the facility.
