On 23 April 2026, the Council of the European Union published the final compromise texts for the proposed Third Payments Services Directive (“PSD3”) and the new Payment Services Regulation (“PSR”), bringing long-awaited visibility to the next phase of EU payments regulation.
Political agreement between the Council and the European Parliament had been announced in late 2025, but the agreed legal texts were not publicly available until now. Their publication allows firms to assess the direction of travel in detail and begin more concrete implementation planning.
The reform package represents the most substantial overhaul of the EU payments regime since PSD2. It adopts a dual structure: PSD3 will replace the existing directive framework for areas that still require national implementation (such as authorisation, supervision and certain prudential matters), while the PSR will create a directly applicable single rulebook across Member States for conduct, transparency, open banking, fraud
