17 weeks until Int’l Payments CEE 2008 - Register
Dates : 5 - 6 November 2008 Venue : Corinthia Towers, Prague

Many thanks to all our speakers and delegates for making IBC’s 5th annual International Payments Central and Eastern Europe a great success once again.

As we have come to expect discussions were wide ranging and lively! Key themes to emerge included

• Dealing with change. The payments business is going through an enormous period of transformation and bankers must focus on how to meet all these new challenges head on whilst delivering the right products and services to their customers – and remaining profitable.
• Increasingly pervasive regulation. SEPA and the Payment Services Directive will change the competitive landscape for banks completely – and bring new competitors to the payments table.
• The remaining uncertainty around SEPA. There is still a lack of clarity at both the technical and the strategic level – the industry must co-operate as never before to resolve these issues.
• The future for domestics ACHs – what sort of pan-European infrastructures do we need to build for tomorrow’s world? And how can domestic ACHs re-invent themselves with new business models, products and services – in both the thin and the thick layers?
• The death of correspondent banking? If SEPA is ultimately delivered on a PEACH basis will we see correspondent banking in Europe die away?
• The power of new technologies. Where do borders begin and end in this internet age? And how will new technologies change the ways in which banks compete in the future? And what new delivery channels will emerge?
• The size of the e-invoicing opportunity. It is estimated that e-invoicing could save Europe 245billion euros. Aligning SEPA and e-invoicing would allow buyers and suppliers to fully automate payables and receivables – so the industry must work together to overcome the barriers to e-invoicing.
• The role for outsourcing/insourcing/white labelling. In these highly competitive times, banks must ask themselves if they want to be a product manufacturer, a product distributor or both.
• Do banks have the right infrastructures for this transformed world? Legacy systems that were designed decades ago are hardly suitable for this electronic age – how should we be tackling this essential issue?
• Optimisation of working capital. Excess working capital in Europe is currently estimated at 475billion euros, so the potential savings to be made are enormous – as are the opportunities for banks who work with their corporate clients to realise this opportunity.
• The business opportunity of workers’ remittances: this market is worth at least $300 billion per annum. To win market share banks must devise a strategy led by technology, with a wide variety of payment types in as many markets as possible. Partnering with other players will be the key to success.
• Banks must become more adaptive and more reactive. If information can now be transferred instantaneously then why can’t payments? As bankers we must look at what technologies young people are using today and build new products and services that will resonate with them.

This is what some of you said:

 

• Speaking opportunities
• Sponsorship / Exhibiting
• Attendee breakdown
• Event reviews
•  
• Request a brochure
• Email this site to a colleague
• Receive event e-updates
•  
•