At the EBAday Payments Conference in Frankfurt earlier this week, SEPA, the forthcoming EU Directive on a single euro payments area, was high on the agenda, with panel participants from ABN AMRO, Barclays, JPM Chase and ING amongst others from banks, vendors and payments service providers.
In a keynote address, Mark Garvin, chairman of the supervisory board at JPMorgan Chase AG, made a plea for greater cooperation within the banking industry - to ensure that the larger banks took a leading role in driving the overall vision of SEPA and that full advantage was taken of this "once in a generation opportunity for the banking industry". As an example, Garvin referred to the cooperation of banks when the Euro was introduced, and told the audience that "There must be an industry body sufficiently representative, well-governed and, most importantly, adequately funded and staffed, to decide the priorities and the new common ground - whether it be rules, interoperability, or the dimensions of the co-operative space". Banks needed to form a coalition to ensure that there was sufficient representative resource to support the European Payments Council and to ensure that standards on governance and interoperability were developed as soon as possible.
JPM Chase's research had convinced them that urgent action was needed if banks were to maintain their franchises and protect themselves against new and emerging competitors. New generations were less patient than current banking users and would demand convenient, simple and fast payment services. Garvin told the audience of bank and banking vendors that the time to act was now. "We risk losing time, money and clients if we do not begin to move faster", he said.
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