Banks’ domestic transfers in euro, 1.34 billion euros in less than six months*
In January of this year, the national payment system in Euro AIPS Euro started operating.
This system enabled for the first time the processing and settlement within the country of national transfers in European currency.
The first statistics of the Bank of Albania show that the volumes of actions carried out through this system are quite large, giving an idea, among others, of the high level of use of the Euro in internal economic transactions.
According to the Bank of Albania, for the period January-June of this year (the system started working on January 24), a total of more than 59 thousand actions were performed in the AIPS-Euro system, for a total value of about 1.34 billion Euros. The trend is continuously increasing month after month. For June, the number of actions reached 14,400, up from about 8,700 in February. While the value of transactions for the month of June reached a value of 274 million Euros, from 202 million Euros in the month of February.
Before the establishment of the AIPS Euro system, national transfers in Euro could only be made through the use of accounts that Albanian banks have in correspondent banks abroad. This route created time delays and, above all, much higher costs compared to Lek transfers. With the new AIPS Euro system, the Bank of Albania has also determined ceiling values that commercial banks can charge to their clients.
For initial payments ordered by clients of the participants and transferred through the AIPS Euro system, with a value less than or equal to 10 thousand Euros, the total commissions applied by the originating participant for each payment order must not be higher than 0.2% of the value transferred and the commission floor cannot be higher than 6 Euros. For payments that are initiated electronically, the total commissions applied by the originating participant for each payment order must not be higher than 50% of the total commissions applied for each payment initiated non-electronically. This means the implementation of the total commission floor higher than 3 Euro, the total commission not higher than 0.1% of the value transferred for a value less than or equal to 10 thousand Euro.
In total, for origination payments ordered by clients of participants and transferred through the AIPS Euro system, the total maximum commissions applied by the originating participant for each payment order, must not be higher than 50 Euros, regardless of the amount. For transfers made through this system, in no case should commissions be applied for the funds on arrival.
In addition to reducing costs, this project is estimated to have positive effects from the point of view of the administration of physical money in Euros by banks and the promotion of electronic payments in this segment of the market, encouraging Albanian citizens to use these instruments. In the past, high commissions often caused banking sector clients to move funds from one bank to another through withdrawals and cash transfers.
Also, according to the Bank of Albania, this project has a wide impact on the economic level, including the retention in the local economy of significant commissions, which were obtained from correspondent banks abroad, as well as the preservation of financial and monetary stability, having all the necessary monitoring mechanisms in terms of this market segment./E.Shehu
Transfertat bankare në Euro brenda vendit, 1.34 miliardë euro në më pak se gjashtë muaj *
*Taken from ‘Monitor Magazine’ . https://www.monitor.al/transfertat-bankare-ne-euro-brenda-vendit-1-34-miliarde-euro-ne-me-pak-se-gjashte-muaj/
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