Five European payment organisations signed a memorandum of understanding in February 2026 to create seamless cross-border payments across Europe by 2027. The signatories - Bancomat (Italy), Bizum (Spain), EPI/Wero (Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands), SIBS/MB WAY (Portugal), and Vipps MobilePay (Denmark, Finland, Norway) - collectively serve approximately 130 million users.
Implementation Roadmap
A central interoperability entity is to be established by the first half of 2026. Cross-border P2P payments will roll out in 2026, with e-commerce and point-of-sale payments targeted for 2027. The technical framework will enable a Bizum user in Spain to pay a Wero merchant in Germany, or a Vipps user in Norway to send money to an MB WAY user in Portugal.
Scope and Scale
The combined reach spans at least 10 European countries, covering markets where domestic A2A schemes already dominate: Bizum holds 90%+ P2P share in Spain, Vipps holds 80%+ in Norway, and MB WAY dominates Portuguese mobile payments. A2A domestic payment transactions in these markets grew at 46% CAGR between 2017-2023, versus 8% for cards.
What This Means
This is arguably the most strategically significant European payment infrastructure event of the period. If executed, it would create a European payment network rivalling Visa and Mastercard in domestic reach - not by building from scratch, but by federating already-leading national schemes. The 2027 timeline for merchant payments is ambitious but credible given the maturity of the individual platforms.
Update (2026-10-10): On 30 September 2026, Bancomat, Bizum, EPI Company/Wero, SIBS-MB WAY and Vipps MobilePay announced the creation of a joint entity named European Network for Payments, headquartered in Madrid, which will operate the common interoperability hub announced under the memorandum of understanding the five signed in February 2026. The founding partners will be equal shareholders of the entity, which will oversee technical coordination and the future expansion of both functionalities and participating solutions.
The phased rollout is planned to start with cross-border peer-to-peer payments, with e-commerce and point-of-sale payments to follow in subsequent phases.