About the show

About

In Brussels, a trilogue is where Parliament, Council and Commission negotiate the final text of a law. The Payments Trilogue borrows the word for the negotiation that, in our view, deserves more attention: the one inside the market itself — between banks, fintechs, and the space in between.

Every two weeks, Michael Salmony (independent moderator), Ralf Ohlhausen (the fintech perspective) and Javier Santamaría (the banking perspective) debate a current European payments topic — from PSD3/PSR, the digital euro and instant payments to wallets, stablecoins and payments sovereignty. Light-hearted in tone, serious in substance, and regularly joined by the people running the schemes, initiatives and institutions under discussion.

The running thesis: when a fintech advocate and a career banker examine the same file, they agree far more often than the regulatory debate suggests. Where the market's interests align, collaboration and self-regulation deliver better, faster and cheaper results than top-down rules. Where they don't, that disagreement is worth hearing out loud — which is exactly what the show does.

Gijs Boudewijn co-founded the show and held the bank chair for episodes 0–20, handing over to Javier Santamaría when he became chair of the European Payments Council — a handover you can watch in TPT #21.

Follow the show

The website

This site carries every episode with video, audio, show notes and transcripts, organised by topic. It sets no cookies and uses no trackers; the YouTube player loads only after you press play.