SEPA and European Payments

The Single Euro Payments Area, the Payments Services Directive, the Eurosystem, TARGET2, STEP2, the Euro and related matters.

Retired Member 

Crisis gives national banks an upper hand in payments

I have been thinking a lot about how the crisis is having a different impact on the world’s national banks, which don’t seem to be suffering as badly as the big international players. In the cards and payments business at least, national banks may be able to take advantage of the crisis to get ahead while big international players struggle to surv...

29 January 2009 /payments

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

Banks should return to single capacity

It's been over twenty years since "Big Bang" in the UK where single capacity business was abolished in favour of duel capacity. Single capacity was where brokers could only deal on behalf of clients earning commission and duel capacity is where brokers can deal for clients but also themselves. The fear was always that brokers could be co...

19 November 2008 /wholesale

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

PSD Breeds European Fragmentation

SEPA credit transfers went live at the beginning of this year and to date can hardly be called a resounding success. What is presented in the media and the party political line spouted by various pundits masks the truth, that there are fundamental problems with SEPA. The problems have a direct line to the drafting of the Payments Services Directi...

21 October 2008 /payments

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

EMXCo An STP Story

As news from the markets veer from bad to worse and each day brings more doom and gloom its worth noting one of the big success story's of the last few years. EMXCo were set up in the 20th century to bring some efficiency into investment funds and other collective products that were still operating like it was the 19th century. The basic original ...

17 October 2008 /retail

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

We are all bankers now

The part nationalisation of UK banks looks like it will become a global phenomenon with the US already moving towards this solution and the EU following suit if weekend reports are accurate. Is this a bad thing for the tax payer? Despite what tax payers feel about greedy bankers and their reckless use of our money, the salvation of the banks is cru...

14 October 2008 /payments /retail

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

Financial Crisis drives bullyboy tactics

Now I know this might be a small issue in the whole scheme of the global financial meltdown but HSBC seems to be plummeting to new depths of desperation. Only this week, I learnt how HSBC has been harassing, a recently graduated student, initially once a week over the past three weeks but more recently, this has increased to daily phone calls. A

09 October 2008 /payments /retail

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

Will we see the return of trade barriers?

In 1929 one of the biggest factors was the introduction of nationalistic trade barriers. These were protective measures to ensure domestic businesses were supported over and above those of the global economy. The effects were disastrous both domestically and worldwide! It was only through the creation of financial instruments in the USA that were ...

08 October 2008 /wholesale

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

New Risks for Banks

For years the market has prided itself on its ability to measure and manage a number of risks that are inherent within financial markets. Counterparty Risks, Operational Risks and those risks based on price movements have had countless amounts of attention and all have had a number of systems developed to assist in risk management. Today the world...

07 October 2008 /regulation

Gary Wright Analyst at BISS Research

Primary market under threat

Corporate finance remains aloof from many of the operational assessments that are focused on systems and procedures in the secondary market. Many people working in corporate finance also have an aloof attitude to operations with hardly any awareness of the settlement requirements of many of the deals they create. Incidentally this also includes cr...

06 October 2008

Hubert O'Donoghue Managing Director at O-C Group

PCI DSS Dos and Don'ts

PCI DSS Dos Secure your network, deploy firewalls and disable unnecessary services and protocols. Even if you are a Card Present merchant, you most likely have internet connectivity which may indirectly expose sensitive data. Be particularly careful with wireless (remember TJX) When you make changes to systems carry out security testing to ...

12 September 2008 /security