MasterCard hosted 250 leading European bankers at its fifth Annual Debit Conference. See the press release here. Among the announcements/findings...:
* taking effect from 1 January 2008, MasterCard SEPA pricing structure will deliver a single, harmonised and transparent set of prices for both intra-SEPA and national transactions,
* MasterCard publicly announces a coherent, sustainable and straightforward SEPA interchange solution, applicable from January 2008. There will be a single SEPA interchange structure that will apply to all SEPA debit transactions,
Furthermore, Dr Laura Rinaldi, KU Leuven, Centre for Economic Studies, estimated the potential efficiency for the European economy just through cost based pricing at about 0.14% of GDP (across 19 markets modelled), With some more 0,09% of gDP coming up if we eliminate the black cash markets altogether.
