(AGENPARL) - Roma, 10 Gennaio 2025 - (AGENPARL) – ven 10 gennaio 2025 Press Release
By the Communications Directorate
Rome, 10 January 2025
Agreement for the creation of an instant
payment systems in the Western Balkans
The ceremony for signing the Letter of Intent to launch a project for creating an
instant payment system in the Western Balkans was held today at Palazzo Koch in
Rome. It was attended by the Governor and the Deputy Governor of the Bank of Italy,
together with the Governors and Deputy Governors of the central banks of Albania,
Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Montenegro.
The cooperation agreement provides for the Bank of Italy to supply an instant
payment system based on a clone of the TIPS service, which is the European platform
for settling payments in real time, designed, created and managed by the Bank on
behalf of the Eurosystem. Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Montenegro
have joined the initiative, which has been approved by the Governing Council of the
European Central Bank (North Macedonia reserves the right to join at a later date).
The new platform, which will be operative within 18 months of the work starting
– scheduled for the next few weeks – will make it possible to carry out payments in all
the currencies of the participating countries. Additional functionalities will be
developed upon the initial implementation phase. It will also set up a bilateral link for
settling payments between the area served by TIPS and the Western Balkan area, using
a technologically advanced and low-cost solution.
The signing of the Letter of Intent is an important step along the path towards
the integration of the Western Balkan countries with the European Union financial
system.
Media Relations Division – Banca d’Italia