Digital euro: ECB urges EU to act: “It is important to have the legislation by the end of the year”

Brussels – The plan for the digital euro is set to move forward. As things stand, progress can only be made with the votes needed to provide the EU and its eurozone with the necessary legal framework, which the European Central Bank is once again calling for through Piero Cipollone, a member of the ECB Executive Board and head of the task force on the digital euro. The European Parliament’s Committee on Economic Affairs is expected to vote on 23 June, following a postponement from the 5 May date previously indicated on the calendar. “We can wait,” the ECB member made clear at the debate with the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “After years of waiting, we can wait; the important thing is to have the legislation in place by the end of the year, so that we can stick to our timetable.” 

The Eurotower is working flat out on the digital euro project, and the plans in Frankfurt are clear and well-defined: the new pan-European payment instrument for transactions within the single market could be available from 2029, provided that the EU institutions complete the legislative process by the end of 2026, and this is what Cipollone is insisting on. He acknowledges that “there is a section of the European Parliament that is sceptical about the digital euro project, starting with the rapporteur for the text”, the Spaniard Fernando Navarrete Rojas (EPP), but insists that the work must continue. 

https://www.eunews.it/en/2025/09/04/cipollone-presents-digital-euro-as-an-anti-crisis-tool/ 

Cipollone also points out that the digital euro project is not intended to compete with US payment networks: “Visa and Mastercard offer credit services; with the digital euro, we are talking about debit, so there is plenty of room in the market for Visa and Mastercard.” In other words, the digital euro would be “an alternative public service, a useful tool for businesses to distribute their products” within the euro area and the single market.