An exciting development this summer: four years after the announcement of the European Payments Initiative (EPI), the first EPI application will finally go live. The digital wallet, called Wero, will launch in Germany, Belgium and France.

Backed by 14 major Eurozone banks and acquirers Worldline and Nets, the EPI has set itself the goal of building a unified pan-European payment system, offering a digital wallet, initially to support P2P and consumer-to-business payments, in 2025-26 followed by online and mobile shopping payments and ultimately point-of-sale payments and digital identity.