PSD3 & PSR: Where the Trilogues Stand
The EU’s payments package — the Payment Services Regulation (PSR) and the Payment Services Directive (PSD3) — is edging closer to political agreement. The EU co-legislators met last week (23 October 2025) for their second-to-last political trialogue. Following the third trilogue, negotiators have narrowed differences on technical provisions but still face key strategic divides.
Most remarkable, however, is that the co-legislators could agree on a shift from open banking to open finance more generally: First, dedicated access interfaces (APIs) will now become mandatory for all account-servicing payment providers, replacing PSD2’s fallback options. This marks a decisive move toward technical uniformity and reliability across the EU. At the same time, the European Parliament has introduced new business continuity obligations, ensuring that third-party providers can continue to operate even in the event of system outages or technical disruptions. Together, these measures strengthen interoperability, but they may also increase implementation costs, particularly for smaller financial institutions.
Second, the PSR introduces a new level of data transparency and user sovereignty. Consumers will have clear visibility over who accesses their data, for what purpose, and for how long and importantly with the option to withdraw consent or opt out entirely. This approach embeds a GDPR-style consent mechanism into the payments framework, giving individuals greater control over their financial information but also raising the risk of fragmenting the open banking ecosystem PSD2 had sought to build.
Main open questions
Diverging views persist among co-legislators on the following issues:
- Cash withdrawals in shops: disagreement persists on ceilings and whether transactions must always undergo strong customer authentication. The Parliament favours a €100 limit, the Council a €150 limit with national flexibility.
- Surcharging: Parliament wants a full EU-wide ban on charges for consumers; Council and the Commission prefer the current regime limited to regulated instruments, with Member-State discretion.
- Access to mobile/NFC functionality: The Parliament pushes for fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND)obligations for device makers; Council fears overlap with the Digital Markets Act.
- FX transparency: both sides agree on disclosure timing and format, but differ on the reference rate (central-bank vs mid-market benchmark).
- Initial capital and crypto fast-track: Parliament and Council remain apart on the capital required for e-money and remittance services and on how far MiCAR-licensed crypto firms should benefit from simplified PSD3 authorisation.
- Open banking: the largest remaining fault line. Parliament retains the fallback access right if APIs fail; Council deletes it, preferring performance standards only. Redirection rules and customer-journey safeguards are likewise unresolved.
With most transparency and prudential provisions stabilised, the next trilogue will need political trade-offs on competition versus consumer protection: uniform versus flexible limits, strict versus pragmatic access rules, and how far to harmonise surcharging and API obligations. If those deals hold, the payments package could still close before 2026, setting the stage for Europe’s next-generation open-payments framework. Negotiators abandoned the idea already in June to negotiate the file together with the open finance FIDA file as re-surfaced “simplification” ambitions supported by the European Commission and various Member States stalled the inter-institutional negotiations.
The current compromise of text is evidence of the tension between the European Parliament, Council, and Commission on how far to go in tightening rules versus preserving national flexibility. PSR/PSD3 represents a major shift from a stand-alone directive to a partially directly applicable regulation, which ensures greater harmonisation, less fragmentation, and uniform supervision, addressing one of PSD2's biggest implementation challenges.
From PSD2 to PSR/PSD3: Structural and Legal Shift
NFU is following this legislative process most intently as the explicit linkage to the Financial Data Access (FiDA) framework becomes apparent, and this legislative procedure may become defining or even a blueprint for FiDA, a legislative framework that may revolutionise banking and insurance likewise. The PSR sets the stage for a unified financial data space, allowing users to manage permissions and access rights across multiple services through a single interface. This alignment bridges the gap between open banking and open finance, marking a pivotal step toward a more integrated and user-centric European digital finance landscape.
Anna-Delia Papenberg, Head of EU Affairs at NFU
