(Finance) – The signing ceremony of the Letter of Intent for the launch of a project for the creation of an instant payments system in the Western Balkan area was held today at Palazzo Koch. Participated in governor Fabio Panetta and the deputy general director of the Bank of Italy Chiara Scotti, together with the governors and deputy governors of the Central Banks of Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Montenegro.
The collaboration agreement – let it be known Bank of Italy in a note – provides for the provision by the Bank of Italy of a system for instant payments based on a twin of the TIPS service, the European platform for the real-time settlement of instant payments designed, created and managed by the Bank of Italy on behalf of the Eurosystem. Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Montenegro have joined the initiative, approved by the Governing Council of the European Central Bank (North Macedonia reserves the right to join in the near future).
There new platform, which will be operational within 18 months of the start of work – expected in the next few weeks – will allow payments to be made in all currencies of the participating countries. Additional features will be developed after the initial implementation phase. There platform it will also allow the prospective establishment of a bilateral connection for the settlement of payments between the area served by TIPS and the western Balkan area, through a technologically advanced and low-cost solution.
There signing of the Letter of Intent represents an important step in the process of integrating the Western Balkan countries with the financial system of the European Union.