Visa Launches Three New EU Digital Wallet Projects

Visa helped launch three new digital wallets in Europe.

The wallets are being rolled out in collaboration with BBVA, Klarna and Vipps MobilePay, according to a Tuesday (Dec. 2) press release provided to PYMNTS. Visa is also working with BANCOMAT on a pilot planned for early 2026.

These are the first Visa-enabled wallets to use near field communication (NFC) technology to allow host card emulation (HCE) on iOS wallets, per the release.

“A major regulatory shift under the EU’s Digital Markets Act opened NFC access to third-party wallets, paving the way for greater competition and innovation in mobile payments,” the release said. “This allows more European players to bring new experiences to market and give consumers more choice.”

Visa research found that mobile payments now account for 59% of all eCommerce transactions in Europe, a figure expected to hit 75% by 2030, according to the release. The research revealed that 32% of Europeans said they depend solely on mobile wallets for purchases.

The new wallets include BBVA Pay in Spain, the first wallet in the world using Visa’s software developer toolkit to directly integrate the Visa Token Service, a technology that safeguards sensitive card information by replacing it with a secure digital token, the release said.

Visa is also working with Klarna as it launches its app in 14 new markets in Europe, allowing the Swedish company to offer tap-to-pay capabilities, per the release.

Vipps MobilePay, a Nordic mobile wallet company, launched a Visa co-badged wallet in Norway, with Denmark, Finland and Sweden expected to follow, the release said.

Meanwhile, the PYMNTS Intelligence report “Apple Pay @11: Usage Is Up, but Competitors Are Gaining Ground” found that in-store mobile wallet use has surged to 31% of consumers, compared to 14% last year. At the same time, in-store transactions involving Apple Pay rose on a more incremental scale, from 8.9% to 10.2%.

“Apple Pay is used for only 10% of eligible in-store purchases despite high acceptance,” PYMNTS wrote last month. “About 85% of merchants now accept Apple Pay, and nearly 60% of consumers own an iPhone, but the payment method accounts for less than 5% of total transactions and only 10.2% of transactions in situations where it could have been used. Growth remains steady but incremental.”