The future of payments in Central and Eastern Europe

In Central and Eastern Europe, the payments landscape is entering a new phase of transformation, shaped by regulatory change, the expansion of instant payments and emerging technologies such as the digital euro, stablecoins and AI-driven agentic payments.

Card payments remain the dominant digital retail payment method across most Central and Eastern European markets. At the same time, the payments landscape continues to evolve as regulatory timelines become clearer and new technological developments emerge.

While several CEE countries already operate domestic instant payment schemes, the rollout of instant euro payments across the European Union is progressing at different speeds across the region.

The timeline for PSD3 and the Payment Services Regulation (PSR) is approaching, while discussions around the digital euro and stablecoins have gained renewed attention.

Interoperability between domestic payment schemes and the broader question of payments sovereignty are also becoming increasingly important topics at the European level.

At the same time, a new concept is increasingly appearing in industry conversations: agentic payments, referring to AI-driven autonomous payment decisions.

For banks in Central and Eastern Europe, these developments unfold in a particularly diverse environment. The region includes EU member states as well as non-EU countries.

Within the EU, some countries have already adopted the euro (eurozone countries), while others continue to operate with their own currencies (non-eurozone countries).

Outside the EU, several countries are gradually integrating into the European payments ecosystem through participation in SEPA schemes.

Understanding how these regulatory and technological developments interact is essential for financial institutions operating across the region.

Card payments: the foundation of the CEE payments ecosystem

Despite rapid innovation in the payments industry, card payments remain a core component of digital retail payments across Central and Eastern Europe.

Over the past two decades, the region has seen significant investment in card acceptance infrastructure, including widespread POS terminal deployment, strong growth in e-commerce and the rapid expansion of mobile wallets built on card tokenization.

Rather than being replaced, card payments are increasingly evolving alongside new payment models. Digital wallets, embedded payments and tokenization continue to rely heavily on existing card networks.

In practice, the evolution of payments in CEE is therefore not about replacing card payments, but about layering new payment models on top of an already mature card infrastructure.

Instant payments across CEE: different regulatory timelines

Instant payments are not new to the CEE region. In several countries they have existed for years, typically based on domestic payment infrastructures and national instant payment schemes.

One of the most important developments shaping the European payments landscape today is the expansion of instant euro payments across the European Union, governed by the EU Instant Payments Regulation (IPR).

Implementation timelines in Central and Eastern Europe differ primarily based on eurozone membership.

Eurozone countries in the region — such as Slovenia, Croatia, Slovakia and Greece — were required to comply earlier in 2025, including the introduction of Verification of Payee (VoP).

For non-eurozone countries such as Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Romania, the key implementation deadline falls in 2027.

A transitional case is Bulgaria, which joined the eurozone in January 2026 and is expected to comply with the Instant Payments Regulation requirements — including VoP — within 2026.

Beyond the EU, neighboring countries are gradually integrating into the European payments ecosystem through SEPA participation. Markets such as Albania, Montenegro, Moldova and North Macedonia are progressively aligning with SEPA payment schemes, even if the Instant Payments Regulation does not apply to them.

Overall, instant euro payments are expanding across Central and Eastern Europe, although their implementation pace differs significantly between eurozone and non-eurozone countries.

A key infrastructure element is the TARGET Instant Payment Settlement (TIPS) platform operated by the European Central Bank, to which banks must connect.

Three connectivity models can typically be observed across the region.

In some countries the domestic clearing house acts as an intermediary between local banks and TIPS. In this model banks access the European instant payment infrastructure through their domestic payment system.

In other markets banks connect to TIPS directly, often using specialized service providers.

A third model is used by subsidiaries of large international banking groups, which may rely on group-level infrastructure and connectivity managed at headquarters level.

Verification of Payee and fraud prevention

The introduction of Verification of Payee (VoP) adds an important new security layer to the European instant payment ecosystem.

VoP allows a payer to verify whether the beneficiary’s name matches the account holder before initiating a payment. This is particularly important in a real-time payment environment where transactions are executed instantly and cannot easily be reversed.

By providing confirmation before the transaction is initiated, VoP helps reduce certain types of fraud, particularly social engineering scams and payment redirection attacks.

The connectivity model for VoP often mirrors the connectivity models used for instant euro payments. In some countries the domestic clearing infrastructure acts as the Routing and Verification Mechanism (RVM) that enables banks to exchange verification requests, while in others banks rely on group-level solutions or specialized service providers — certified RVMs — to handle VoP requests.

Some countries are exploring extending Verification of Payee also to domestic payments, while in others similar solutions have already been introduced at the national level to further strengthen fraud prevention across local payment ecosystems.

PSD3 and the next phase of open banking

Another major regulatory development is the upcoming PSD3 / PSR framework, which will also apply to EU member states across the CEE region.

Current expectations point to an implementation horizon around 2027–2028.

The objective of PSD3 and PSR is to strengthen the open banking ecosystem by improving:

• API reliability 
• operational resilience 
• fraud liability rules 
• market access for third-party providers

For banks across Central and Eastern Europe, this represents not only a technology project, but also a broader operational transformation involving governance, monitoring and service quality.

The digital euro and European payments sovereignty

The digital euro initiative led by the European Central Bank is currently in its preparation phase.

The project focuses on defining the operational model, technical infrastructure and regulatory framework for a potential retail central bank digital currency, the digital euro.

A key milestone may come during 2026, when the European Parliament is expected to define its legislative position on the digital euro framework, enabling negotiations with EU member states on the final regulation.

If legislators reach agreement, pilot phases could begin around 2027, while a potential full rollout is discussed around 2029.

Beyond its technological dimension, the digital euro is also increasingly discussed as an important element of strengthening Europe’s payments sovereignty, ensuring that critical payment infrastructures remain under European governance.

For non-eurozone countries in Central and Eastern Europe the picture is more nuanced. Direct access to the digital euro would naturally require eurozone membership. At the same time, alternative access models could theoretically emerge depending on regulatory design or cross-border banking arrangements.

From a sovereignty perspective, however, the digital euro may not necessarily provide a complete answer for CEE countries outside the eurozone, as governance and monetary control would remain anchored within the euro area.

European payment scheme interoperability

Another emerging development in Europe is the growing cooperation between domestic mobile and instant payment schemes.

Industry initiatives such as the European Mobile Payment Systems Association (EMPSA) aim to strengthen collaboration between national mobile payment solutions across Europe through knowledge sharing and cooperation initiatives.

A more concrete step toward cross-border interoperability is represented by the European Payments Alliance (EuroPA) initiative, which focuses on enabling cross-border payments between domestic account-to-account mobile payment systems.

From a Central and Eastern European perspective, this development may become increasingly relevant. Several domestic instant payment solutions already exist in the region, including qvik in Hungary, RoPay in Romania, BLIK in Poland, Flik in Slovenia, and IRIS in Greece.

With the exception of IRIS, these schemes are not currently part of the EuroPA interoperability framework, although they could represent natural candidates for future participation.

As domestic instant payment ecosystems continue to develop across the region, connecting these solutions through European interoperability initiatives could gradually enable cross-border account-to-account payments while allowing users to continue using their local mobile payment applications.

Another parallel development is the rollout of Wero, the wallet solution developed by the European Payments Initiative (EPI). Wero aims to build a pan-European payment scheme, initially expanding across eurozone markets and targeting use cases such as peer-to-peer payments, e-commerce and eventually point-of-sale transactions.

Together, these developments may create an opportunity for Central and Eastern Europe to play a more visible role in the development of interoperable European payment infrastructures, while also contributing to the broader objective of strengthening Europe’s payments sovereignty.

Stablecoins and new settlement possibilities

Stablecoins are another topic receiving increasing attention in the financial industry.

From a financial system perspective, stablecoins are not considered monetary instruments, but rather settlement infrastructure innovations that may complement existing payment and financial market infrastructures.

Unlike central bank digital currencies, stablecoins are typically issued by private entities and represent digital tokens linked to stable assets such as fiat currencies (typically the euro or the US dollar).

From a banking perspective potential use cases include:

• cross-border B2B settlement 
• 24/7 liquidity management 
• tokenized securities settlement 
• intraday treasury operations

However, regulatory frameworks and market structures are still evolving, meaning that stablecoins remain primarily a strategic monitoring and pilot domain for most banks in CEE.

The emerging concept of agentic payments

A newer concept gaining attention in the payments industry is the concept of agentic payments.

The idea behind agentic payments is that in the future an increasing number of payment decisions may be made not directly by humans but by digital agents, such as AI-supported software systems.

In such scenarios transactions could be initiated automatically based on predefined goals, optimization criteria or operational triggers. Corporate systems might automatically trigger supplier payments when inventory reaches a critical level, while digital assistants could decide when to renew subscriptions or select the most efficient payment option.

Automated payments themselves are not new. What is changing is the increasing level of autonomy and intelligence in decision-making.

This development raises important questions around liability, authentication and governance. Payment infrastructures will increasingly need to support machine-to-machine transactions while maintaining strong security frameworks.

In such environments, real-time payment infrastructures — including instant payments and potentially new settlement instruments such as stablecoins — could play an increasingly important role in enabling autonomous financial transactions.

Strategic outlook for the CEE region

For banks operating in Central and Eastern Europe, the evolving payments landscape is shaped by a combination of regulatory change, technological innovation and the growing strategic debate around European payments sovereignty.

Card payments will remain a key pillar of the payments ecosystem.

At the same time, instant payments will continue to expand across the region, although their implementation timelines and priorities differ across countries.

Eurozone countries in the region have already implemented instant euro payments and Verification of Payee. Their focus will increasingly shift towards optimization, fraud prevention, PSD3 readiness and preparing for potential digital euro developments.

Non-eurozone EU countries face the most immediate implementation challenge as banks prepare for the 2027 deadlines for instant euro payments and VoP.

Countries outside the EU will continue focusing on gradual alignment with European payment schemes.

Despite these differences, several common trends apply across the region.

Fraud prevention and operational resilience will become increasingly important priorities.

Longer-term developments such as the digital euro, interoperable European payment schemes, stablecoins and AI-driven payment models will continue shaping the strategic direction of the industry, while CEE countries may also play an important role in the broader discussion around the establishment of European payments sovereignty.

In the coming years, the institutions that succeed will be those able to combine innovation with stable and resilient payment infrastructures while navigating an increasingly complex technological and regulatory landscape.