European Central Bank Executive: Digital Euro Crucial for Payment Sovereignty

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European Central Bank (ECB) Executive Board member Piero Cipollone has highlighted the strategic importance of a digital euro in improving the euro area’s control over its payment systems amid geopolitical uncertainty. 

Cipollone told El País, the most circulated newspaper in Spain, that:

All these potential geopolitical tensions and the weaponisation of every conceivable tool clearly increase the level of risk. This reinforces the case for a European payment system that can meet all our payment needs and is built on European technology and infrastructure, in other words, a system that is fully under our control.

Cipollone described the digital euro as “public money in digital form,” noting the continued decline in cash use, which accounted for about 24% of daily transaction value in 2024, down from 40% in 2019. As consumers and businesses turn to digital payments, Cipollone argued that it was the responsibility of the ECB to “provide a means of payment that meets the needs of Europeans and avoids excessive dependencies.”

Cipollone noted that merchants currently accepting digital payments in Europe would, in the future, be required to accept the digital euro due to its status as legal tender across the euro area, creating a single standard for the digital currency. 

The ECB announced last October that it was moving into the “next and final phase” of its central-bank digital currency project, aiming for a full rollout of the digital euro across Europe in 2029.