Moldova's accession to the Single Euro Payments Area will be an important step in the context of Moldova's accession to the EU and will bring a lot of benefits to citizens - Octavian Armasu.
Governor of the National Bank of Moldova stated this in his speech at the opening of the international conference "Moldova's Accession to the Single Euro Payments Area - achievements and perspectives". He noted that Moldova's accession to the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) is an event of national importance, a national project of the country and an important step in the context of Moldova's accession to the European Union. "It is a new stage in the development of the payment infrastructure, opening of the borders for the payments market without barriers, which will allow the citizens of Moldova to make non-cash payments to and from the euro zone - much safer, faster and more convenient", the head of the National Bank stressed. He appreciated the assistance of the development partners in achieving this objective, and expressed his gratitude and appreciation to the partners of the Twinning technical assistance project, who help the NBM to prepare the accession file, especially to the EU experts from this project, EU representatives. Octavian Armasu noted that Moldova's accession to SEPA is a complex process that involves joint and coordinated actions by many Moldovan authorities to ensure the fulfillment of the accession criteria. "This is the reason why we are all gathered here today," NBM Governor said. He drew attention to the fact that over the past 5 years, the Moldovan banking system has gone through a process of deep reform of both the regulatory framework and governance in commercial banks and in the Central Bank. In particular, Octavian Armasu mentioned the reforms in the field of prevention of money laundering and terrorism financing. "The results of these reforms are visible - we have a stable banking system, which has already proved its resilience in many crises. At the same time, a sound banking system is the basis for the next step in its development - innovation and implementation of new technologies. We can say with certainty that the Moldovan financial system is mature enough to develop a partnership with the EU financial and banking community, especially in the field of payment systems development," NBM Governor emphasized. According to him, the strong economic relations that have developed in recent years between Moldova and the EU represent an additional argument justifying the efforts to become a member state of the SEPA geographical area. "Throughout this process, we, the authorities as well as representatives of the financial market should act as a unified team with the common goal of Moldova's accession to SEPA and migration of euro payments to payment schemes within SEPA. During this conference, along with technical assistance project experts, representatives of Moldovan authorities, colleagues from the National Bank of Moldova and partner central banks and, last but not least, the Director General of the European Payments Council, who is our guest, we propose to inform you responsibly about the benefits of Moldova's accession to the Single Euro Payments Area, the problems we may encounter and how we will deal with them," NBM Governor emphasized. // 17.11.2022 - InfoMarket
