Things are slowly getting lonely in the intermediate company of the European Payments Initiative (EPI).

The project for a European payment method, which was actually supposed to stand up to the American heavyweights Mastercard, Visa and Paypal, has lost three more prominent supporters with the Federal Association of Volksbanken and Raiffeisenbanken (BVR), DZ Bank and Hypovereinsbank (HVB).

Now the savings banks, Deutsche Bank, some French banks and ING are also involved with their Belgian business.

Gregory Bruner

Editor in Business.

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The BVR confirmed the withdrawal of the cooperative financial group from the project in a statement on Tuesday evening.

It is true that they "worked intensively to find a solution that reconciles customer interests and functional added value with a high level of distribution".

Ultimately, however, "no common ground was found" with the other participants.

For similar reasons, Commerzbank announced its withdrawal from the project in January.

"The remaining range and relatively high initial investments are no longer consistent - so the essential prerequisites for a strategic investment are not met," it said from there in January.

Italy's banks, most Spanish banks apart from Santander and Dutch banks also jumped out.

Supporters are struggling for funding

As a reaction to the departure of the cooperative financial group, the German Savings Banks and Giro Association asserted that it would continue to support the goal of a common payment method in Europe.

"However, the success of EPI is largely dependent on the fact that there is broad support in the German market," it said in a statement.

As the remaining partner in Germany, Deutsche Bank has so far held back with statements.

She had previously pledged her support.

In financial circles it is said that the remaining parties will meet in the coming days to discuss how to proceed.

The ever-shrinking circle must struggle to find €1.5 billion in funding for the EPI.

Those involved cannot hope for support from public funds from Germany.

The Federal Ministry of Finance rejected financial injections for the project at the beginning of February, even if they want to continue to provide political backing.

Should the PPI fall, European banks will lose further ground in the battle for the payment service provider market.

Last fall, Mastercard announced the end of the "Maestro" brand, which allows European bank card users to withdraw money and pay with their cards throughout Europe.

Instead, credit or debit cards with the Mastercard logo should appear.

It would then be possible for German banks and savings banks, for example, to continue using the “Girocard” brand.

However, it would no longer work abroad without the Maestro logo.

This would mean that the credit card providers Mastercard and Visa would continue to gain market power without serious European alternatives.