The EKS, developed and maintained by Latvijas Banka, ensures the settlement of customer interbank payments in euro by the Latvian payment market participants via the instant payment service and the clearing service across the SEPA.
The EKS comprises the following direct participants: 11 credit institutions, the Treasury and Latvijas Banka. Six out of eight credit institutions offering instant payments in Latvia and Latvijas Banka offered them via the EKS instant payment service.
Chart 1
Volume and value of payments processed in the EKS
101.2 million SEPA credit transfers totalling 159.8 billion euro were executed in the EKS (in the instant payment service and the clearing service combined). The volume and value of the payments executed in the EKS increased by 9.3% and 13.3% respectively year-on-year.
In the context of the EKS development, Latvijas Banka was among the first to start using the new settlement model of the STEP2-T system (Continuous Gross Settlement).
The EKS has been developed by way of technological solutions providing for a high degree of operational performance and cyber security checked in external cyber security tests in 2021.