P27 has withdrawn its clearing license application. The vision of a pan-Nordic real time payments system thus collapses. „Our vision was too ambitious and complex.”

The future of P27 Nordic Payments (P27), the largest regional, cross-border, instant payment project to be attempted in history, is uncertain. In a statement released on Thursday, the company announced that it has withdrawn its clearing licence application from Finansinspektionen, the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority.

„P27 has of today decided to withdraw its clearing license application from Finansinspektionen. The prerequisites for building a new Nordic system critical payment infrastructure have changed since P27 was launched in 2019. New requirements and regulations have challenged P27’s operating model.” – according to the press release.

The fact that P27 will not handle the Swish-flow in Sweden and the recent decision by the Danish banking sector to proceed with other payment solutions, has put the company in a new position.

„We fully understand and endorse the high requirements and expectations which applies to us as a provider of critical payment infrastructure. We are now in a dialogue with our owner banks to evaluate the best options going forward. We have a strong banking community in Sweden that have always taken common responsibility to ensure a resilient and robust payment infrastructure.” –  says Paula da Silva, CEO of P27.

In 2019, P27 set out on an ambitious journey to transform the Nordic payment markets and build the world’s first real-time cross-border payment platform.

„Our vision was to provide a better payments infrastructure to the 27 million people living in the Nordics, with an optimistic timeline. Lately, it is evident that our vision was too ambitious and complex. Hence, we need to reassess our future ambition in the Nordic payments market.” – continues Paula da Silva.

The announcement comes amid turbulent times for the group, which had submitted its second application for a clearing licence in 2022 after its initial application in 2019 was rejected by the supervisor, according to Finextra.

It was recently made public that Denmark’s banking sector had decided to proceed with other solutions instead of the P27 project, choosing to pursue an alternative review of modernising the country’s payment infrastructure. Additionally, the Swedish Instant Payment scheme also decided in recent weeks that it will work with other players to modernise the country’s payment schemes.

P27 is the owner of Bankgirot and the two companies will continue to cooperate to make sure that the current payment infrastructure is operational as long as needed.