Spain, at the forefront of interoperability and the digitalization of peer-to-peer payments in Europe

Nuek, the payments infrastructure technology company that forms part of Minsait (Indra Group), has presented the 2025 report titled The digitalization of peer-to-peer payment flows, drawn up with Analistas Financieros Internacionales (Afi), which focuses on the digitalization of domestic and international payment flows between individuals (remittances).

The study finds that peer-to-peer (P2P) payments have put their purely experimental phase behind them and entered a stage featuring scaling, functional convergence and internationalization. On the one hand, instant payment solutions are becoming established as a real alternative to cash in several markets, while, on the other, users are beginning to demand that the apps they use every day in their own countries should also enable them to send money abroad with the same ease, cost and speed. Against this global backdrop, Spain is consolidating its standing as a European benchmark for the adoption of instant peer-to-peer payments and the digitalization of international remittances, as a result of the penetration of Bizum and its interoperability with Portugal and Italy. The digital channel is now the main one in all of the age groups, allowing significant savings with respect to the physical channel, although challenges related to transparency and traceability still persist.

Domestic P2P payments: from mass adoption to the leap towards businesses

According to the survey of the banked population in Nuek’s report, instant transfers are now the method used by 25% of users to pay other people. In Spain, instant peer-to-peer transfers, particularly ones via Bizum, have achieved significant market penetration, positioning it in the group of leading European countries together with Portugal and on a par with other ones such as Brazil. Although Brazil (Pix) and Portugal (MB Way) have managed to unseat cash as the preferred payment method between individuals, Spain is moving rapidly in the same direction, with Bizum consolidating its standing as a real alternative to physical money.

Moreover, now that the critical mass in peer-to-peer payments has been obtained, these solutions are being extended to businesses, especially online ones. Over 30% of users prefer these solutions for their online purchases in Brazil and Portugal.

Towards more interoperable international P2P payments

The next vector of evolution is clear: to move these domestic experiences to the international field. The Nuek Barometer shows that, in almost all of the countries analyzed, most users who perform instant domestic P2P transfers would be willing to use the same solution to make cross-border payments. 

In fact, in Spain, they are now spreading to online commerce, in a trend similar to the one in Brazil and Portugal, where over 30% of banked users prefer this method for their online purchases.

However, the reality of the range of options still lags behind this expectation. Most domestic P2P solutions don’t allow money to be sent abroad yet, although some pilot projects are now being deployed. In Europe, the partnership between Bizum (Spain and Andorra), MB Way (Portugal) and Bancomat Pay (Italy) now allows instant cross-border P2P payments between the four countries, following the progressive roll-out of the service launched in 2025.

This market movement has come in the wake of the regulatory drive; the European Instant Payments Regulation, approved in 2024, obliges providers in Spain and the rest of the European Union (EU) that offer transfers in euros to also allow instant payments in less than 10 seconds, 24 days a week and throughout the EU, with fees that cannot exceed those for ordinary transfers.

The result is a shift in phases from isolated domestic P2P systems to an ecosystem that’s becoming more connected, regulated and interoperable, both within and between regions.

“The upsurge in peer-to-peer payments reflects an underlying transformation; users no longer compare one bank with another, they compare their payment experience with the one they enjoy on their mobile app. They expect to operate without barriers, in real time and transparently, regardless of the country they or their families find themselves in”, declared Nuek CEO Javier Rey. “The challenge now lies in ensuring that the technology, regulation and collaboration models involving financial and non-financial players live up to these expectations for both domestic payments and remittances”.

Remittances: an increasingly digital flow... that still comes up against frictions

The international scale of peer-to-peer payments is expressed with particular intensity in remittances, a flow which, despite lagging behind domestic payments, is undergoing a speedy digitalization process:

• 63% of the banked population that use remittances already go to websites and apps to send and receive money to and from abroad.
• In Spain, the digital channel for sending and receiving remittances is the main one in all of the age groups (~80%), surpassing the European average and lying well above Latin America, where the physical channel remains important for people over 55 years of age.

In addition to the convenience, the report quantifies the economic benefits of the digital channel. In Europe, users can save up to $2.6 (€2.23) for every €200 they send by migrating from the physical to the digital channel. Despite the digitalization, 40% of Spanish users continue to encounter frictions in their remittances, particularly in terms of their traceability, transparency and accreditation times, showing that there is still room for improvement to match the experience of this payment method in the domestic sphere.

“What we can see in this report is that the domestic and international versions of peer-to-peer payments (remittances) are no longer two separate worlds. Users are seeking a seamless experience, whereby the solution they use to split an account in their home town enables them to send money to another country with the same degrees of immediacy and cost control and a visible payment status. This is where the next competitive edge in payments is going to play out”, added Rey.