It is certainly an understatement to say that this landscape may be significantly altered given technological developments and changes in consumer preferences underway. As these developments and changes unfold, both the « front-end » arrangements that ensure the interaction between the payer or payee and the payment service provider, to initiate or receive payments, and the « back-end » arrangements that transfer information and funds between the payer and the payee, will change. With the emergence of so called « crypto-assets » like the bitcoin and so called « stablecoins », we may also see new settlement assets develop which may compete against and possibly, according to their promoters, replace commercial and central bank money as settlement assets at the center of our payment systems.
