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16/10/2025

Europe’s strategic autonomy starts at its borders:

Montenegro’s SEPA leap

Montenegro’s full integration into Europe’s payment system shows that enlargement can advance through delivery and discipline, bringing citizens and businesses tangible benefits long before accession

Earlier this month Montenegro quietly reshaped its relationship with Europe. By sending and receiving its first Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) transactions, it joined Europe’s payment infrastructure in full. What began as a technical reform has become a symbol of efficiency and belonging, bringing faster, cheaper, and more reliable transfers to citizens and businesses alike.

For years, EU enlargement has been under fire. Critics say it’s too slow, too abstract, too distant from daily life. Montenegro’s SEPA leap proves it doesn’t have to be this way. EU reforms can deliver immediate, concrete gains for candidate countries: lower costs for firms, faster payments for families, and deeper ties with Europe’s economic core.

Montenegro adopted the Deutsche Mark in the 1990s to restore stability after conflict and hyperinflation. When the euro replaced the Mark in 2002, Montenegro followed suit. Yet for over two decades, while citizens used the euro, their payments travelled through costly and fragmented channels. That era is now over.

Until recently, sending and receiving euros abroad from Montenegro cost an average of €73.40 per transaction. Now, under SEPA, a transfer of up to €200 costs under two cents; transfers up to €20,000 cost no more than €1.99. For families, this means sending remittances without extortionate fees. For small businesses, trade is finally affordable. For Europe, there is a more connected, efficient, and inclusive payments area.

This milestone crowns years of disciplined reform. Montenegro became the first EU candidate to fulfil SEPA requirements in 2024. The Central Bank of Montenegro has since worked relentlessly with all eleven commercial banks to align systems, rules, and standards with Europe’s payment infrastructure.

SEPA is more than technical plumbing. It is the invisible infrastructure of Europe’s single market with over 45 billion transactions annually, enabling trade, investment, and mobility. It connects 41 countries and nearly 540 million people, demonstrating that the euro is more than a currency – it is a backbone of trust, economic strength, and international influence.

Joining SEPA is not just about cheaper transfers. It is about belonging to the core infrastructure of Europe’s economy. For a Montenegrin exporter of wine or digital services, payments from EU clients that once took days and carried heavy fees now settle within hours at minimal cost. For a student in the Netherlands or Austria, paying tuition is as easy as a domestic transfer. For small firms, efficient payments translate into competitiveness and growth.

Montenegro’s participation is both practical and symbolic: proof of meeting high standards and readiness to contribute to Europe’s financial architecture. It marks a shift from fragmentation to fairness, from aspiration to participation. It shows that enlargement can advance by delivery, not declaration. When reforms are implemented and standards met, the EU can open its systems to mutual benefit.

For Europe, extending these systems to candidate countries is both inclusive and strategic. It reinforces the euro’s international role, strengthens financial stability, and advances the EU’s New Growth Plan for the Western Balkans – turning alignment into access and reforms into tangible gains.

As stablecoins and big-tech platforms expand, control over payment rails has become key to Europe’s strategic autonomy. By deepening SEPA and expanding instant-payment platforms like TIPS, the EU consolidates its power to set global standards rooted in transparency, interoperability, and trust.

Montenegro’s participation is therefore not peripheral but integral: part of Europe’s effort to extend its financial architecture to enlargement economies, bolster the euro’s credibility, and ensure innovation serves both citizens and stability.

Last week’s SEPA transactions from Montenegro were joined by those from Albania, North Macedonia, and Moldova, signalling the birth of a shared European payment space across the enlargement region. Once all candidate economies are integrated, an additional 60 million people will share the same European payment framework. This is how the Single Market grows stronger: by turning standards into trust, lowering costs into competitiveness, and transforming integration into tangible progress.

The broader lesson is clear. Enlargement debates can get distracted by geopolitics or fears of institutional overstretch. SEPA demonstrates that there is a different path, one of gradual, measurable integration that citizens can feel from the start. It is also a concrete pillar of the EU’s New Growth Plan for the Western Balkans, which turns alignment into access and reforms into measurable gains.