Brussels, 21/11/2006 (Agence Europe) - On 20 November the European central Bank (ECB) published a progress report entitled “The Eurosystem's View of a “SEPA for Cards””. The ECB points out that migration to SEPA requires card schemes and banking communities to decide on their strategic positioning within SEPA and then elaborate their business plans and maintain efficiency and low cost levels. These include the need for each card scheme to define and publicly disclose a medium to long-term strategy which is consistent with the objectives of SEPA; to protect confidentiality of personal data; to contribute to the design of standards with a clear commitment for implementation on time; to have a strategy on how to reduce fraud, and especially cross-border fraud; and to foster competition. In this respect, the report calls upon competition authorities in particular to define harmonised rules concerning interchange fees. The document is available on the ECB website: http: //http://www.ecb.int/pub/pdf/other/eurosystemsviewsepacardsen.pdf. (ab)