Digital Euro Clears Parliament: Mandatory Merchant Acceptance Is On the Table

The European Parliament voted on Thursday to open final negotiations on the digital euro, backing the file by 416 votes to 169 with 22 abstentions. Trilogue talks with the Council, represented by the Irish Presidency, are expected to begin shortly.

Parliament’s negotiating position, led by rapporteur Fernando Navarrete Rojas, sketches what the ECB issued currency would look like in practice. It works online and offline, basic services such as opening and holding an account are free, individual holdings are capped to protect bank deposits, and privacy safeguards keep transaction data processing to the minimum the system needs. Cash gets parallel protection: euro area states must keep it accessible and businesses cannot refuse it.

Digital euro acceptance would be mandatory for most merchants

The clause merchants should read twice is acceptance. Under Parliament’s text, most businesses would be required to accept digital euro payments, with carve outs only for the self employed and for small and micro enterprises that do not already take other digital payments. That is a new mandated payment method arriving with its own settlement, reconciliation and checkout questions, and most merchants will not get a vote on whether to support it.

Nothing bites tomorrow. Trilogue can run a year or more, and any launch follows years after the legal text. But the EU regulatory stack is visibly piling up: PSD3 and the PSR are already on their own 18 month clock, and the digital euro now adds a second track to watch. The ECB has since named the 36 PSPs who will run the digital euro pilot, which puts names to the acquirers who would carry acceptance. For the groundwork on how the current rails fit together, start with our EU payments primer.

Sources
1. European Parliament, “Digital euro: MEPs ready to start negotiations,” press release, 9 July 2026.
2. HowTheyVote.eu, “Establishment of the digital euro,” roll call record A10-0185/2026, 9 July 2026.