September 2010 edition

Table of contents

Editorial by Michael Montoya, UBS AG, SIX Interbank Clearing Board of Directors Member

Europe leads the way in providing the state-of-the-art card infrastructure
All card business service providers compete with one another, from the institutions as issuers and the card organizations, to the acquirers and payment processors, to the payment service providers and merchants. The card industry as a whole also has a powerful common competitor: cash. Jörg Metzelaers from Visa Europe is upbeat over a constructive cooperation between the parties involved and sees a great deal of growth potential still existing in cashless payment transactions.

MIF – The EU Commission’s perspective
Following the European Commission’s retail banking sector inquiry published in early 2007, the Commission has conducted a number of high-priority investigations in the payments sector. The timeliness of such actions was underlined by the banking industry's self-regulatory SEPA project, which is aimed at creating an integrated payments market.

Economies of scale in the card business
The propagation of payment cards has been conquering the world for the last 60 years thanks to their various usage possibilities, flexibility and convenience. In Switzerland alone, more than 600 million transactions are generated at 150,000 acceptance points by more than 10 million cards. The annual industry growth rate is higher than 8%.

The future of SEPA direct debit is now
At the end of 2009, SIX Group launched its SEPA Direct Debit Service for the European market. Thus far, banks from Switzerland, Luxembourg, Monaco, Germany and Spain have become users of the offering, which enables to collect pan-European standardized SEPA direct debits. The growth potential is considerable.

Cover payments in euro via SWIFT
As of November 22, 2010, the Swiss payment system euroSIC will be able to process the message type MT202COV. Two years ago, at its launch by SWIFT, the Swiss financial center voiced opposition to the introduction. But demand from the financial institutions has caused reconsideration.