The digital euro now has a date. Under current plans it should be available for retail payments from 2029, with a pilot project involving 36 payment service providers due to start in 2027. The final phase of talks between the European Parliament and member states about how it will work is under way right now.

What it actually is

The most important distinction first: the digital euro is not a cryptocurrency. It is not an independent digital currency floating on market expectations - it is a digital form of the euro, issued and guaranteed by the European Central Bank.

In practice, users would have a digital wallet allowing them to pay by phone, card or another device - in shops, online and between individuals. In other words, central bank money in digital form, alongside cash and existing electronic payments.

Why the EU is doing this now

In parallel with the public project, the private sector is building its own network. The European payment alliance EuroPA and the European Payments Initiative EPI signed an agreement to connect their instant payment systems - a platform that would potentially cover around 380 million users across 15 member states.

EuroPA brings together several national payment systems: the Spanish-Andorran Bizum, Italy's Bancomat, Poland's Blik and the Nordic Vipps MobilePay. EPI, meanwhile, is developing the Wero payment brand, already present in Germany, Belgium, France and the Netherlands.

Taken together, the goal is obvious and needs no diplomatic translation: Europe wants its own payment infrastructure. Every card payment today largely runs through infrastructure that is not European, and at a time when trade relations with the US are strained, dependence on someone else's payment system looks different than it did five years ago.

Where we stand in all this

Macedonia is not in the eurozone, so the digital euro will not arrive here automatically. But the denar is pegged to the euro, a huge share of trade is with the EU, and a large number of families regularly receive money from abroad - most often in euros.

When European payment infrastructure changes, so does the route those payments take. Whether the domestic banking system will be ready for that, or find out about it in 2029, is a question somebody needs to ask before 2029.

Three years sounds like a lot. It is not - especially for a system that has not even finished with instant payments yet.