
rules they are a-changing
How Regulations are Reshaping the Payments IndustryPayments is as large a topic as it is an
industry, and who better to write this introduction than our very own Head of
Compliance, Risk and Security, Jasna
Fumagalli, who has been working in banking from the start of her business
career and is our resident expert when it comes to regulations.
Today, the payments industry is experiencing many changes and shifts and is set to experience even more in the very near future. This is why we have dedicated our 12th issue to the payments industry and regulations, considering them both from different aspects and taking into account many changes on the horizon.

Jasna Fumagalli, Head of Compliance, Risk and Security, Mercury Processing Services International
The introduction of GDPR was possibly the most expected, stressed over and talked about event of 2018 in EU's financial and digital sectors. There were many projections and predictions in the months leading up to the May 2018 deadline and now, at the start of 2019, we assessed what did and what did not come to pass when it comes to GDPR.
The attention of the industry is now visibly directed towards regulations and their ever increasing importance, which means that GDPR and PSD2 are, and will continue to be, significant factors. Consequently, in this issue we have taken a deep dive into PSD2 to investigate its potential issues and also to see how various businesses are preparing for the upcoming payments regulations.

The implementation of biometrics has been of growing interest to payment service providers, which is why we took a snapshot of the current state of affairs regarding this technology, both in the EU and globally.
POS is not escaping the ever mutating tides of our modern world,
but is rather quite imaginatively staying the course along with new and
interesting developments regarding ATM
2.0.
Speaking of revolutionary technology, quantum computing is slowly but surely
making more and more waves, setting all our sails towards easy accessibility
and business applications. How might it affect payments? We have considered
a few possibilities.
And finally, two more
big words that seem to be front and center in both mainstream and industry
news: Brexit and cryptocurrencies. We try to foresee how the fast approaching Brexit will impact the EU payments industry and we investigate what steps the EU is making towards regulating cryptocurrencies, with new ones appearing almost on a daily basis.