Italyʹs Istituto Centrale delle Banche Popolari Italiane (ICBPI) and EBA Clearing announced an agreement to ensure full interoperability between the banks using ICBPI's payment systems and those in the other Countries included in the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) for exchange, clearing and settlement transactions.
Bank of Italy will act as ICBPI'ʹs settlement bank based on the funds received by the banks.
Eba Clearing, ICBPI and Bank of Italy have been cooperating for a long time to successfully complete the migration to SEPA. The interoperability agreement will be a part of two-‐‑step process. The Banks using ICBPI'ʹs systems will be fully compliant and therefore will benefit from all the advantages of euro-‐‑zone integration as far as payments are concerned.
By February 1st, 2014 all domestic payment systems of individual Countries for bank transfers, direct debits and payment cards are required to migrate to the SEPA model. The agreement between ICBPI and EBA Clearing allows to comply with the deadlines established by the relevant regulations.
"ʺEBA Clearing has been processing a large share of Italian domestic payments since 2006, and we have always been striving to ensure that all operations run smoothly and with a view to the SEPA migration"ʺ, says Gilber Lichter, CEO of EBA CLEARING. "ʺWith this agreement, EBA CLEARING, as the main operator, will be ready and set to guarantee that SEPA is successful"ʺ.
"We are very satisfied with this result. Thanks to the cooperation with EBA Clearing and Bank of Italy, an important step has been taken towards the realization of SEPA"ʺ, says Giuseppe Capponcelli, CEO of ICBPI. "ʺOnce again, ICBPI proves to be one of the key players in the programme and consolidates its strategic role as a Systemic Bank, capable of offering its customers fresh opportunities to improve their profitability, increasing revenues and cutting costs. To this perspective, we will continue to actively participate in all the projects aimed at euro-‐‑zone harmonisation".