payments. many other countries are undergoing similar transformations, including the us with fednow and australia ’ s new payments platform. traditionally, however, there has been less focus on cross - border payments even though they are so significant in both value and volume. the value of cross - border payments is estimated to increase from almost $ 150 trillion in 2017 – already a pretty substantial figure – to over $ 250 trillion by 2027, equating to a rise of over $ 100 trillion in just 10 years. 1 https : / / www. bcg. com / en - ch / publications / interactives / global - payments - interactive - edition all speeches are available online at www. bankofengland. co. uk / news / speeches and @ boe _ pressoffice despite their importance, cross - border payments still suffer from a number of challenges around cost, speed, access and transparency. as a stylised fact, it can, in certain cases, take up to 10 days to transfer money to another country, it can cost up to 10 % of the value of the transfer and be up to 10 times more expensive than a domestic payment. admittedly, not all cross - border payments fit this mould, and there have been great advances in recent years. for example, in swift gpi where more than one third of payments arrive within 30 minutes and almost all of them within 24 hours. but, across the overall cross - border market, there are still less than half of all payments being completed within 24 hours : this needs to change. in discussing cross - border payments, we are not just talking about big companies or countries. the world bank estimates that flows of remittances to some economies are greater than 30 % of their country ’ s gdp2 and we know that this problem often hits individuals and small companies hard. faster, cheaper, more transparent, and more inclusive cross - border payment services would have widespread benefits for citizens across the globe both directly and by supporting economic growth, international trade and global development. international work to enhance cross - border payments the challenge of cross - border payments has been on the agenda for a long time. but bringing about change in this multi - dimensional area is not easy. it requires strong international collaboration and commitment. it was, therefore, very welcome that enhancing cross - border payments was set as a priority for the saudi arabian presidency of the g20 this year. this important g20 initiative has been structured around a three - stage process

will give you just a few examples based on a set of ecb indicators on the level of integration in euro area financial and banking markets. • since the introduction of the euro, the cross - country standard deviation of interest rates in the interbank money market has plummeted. back in january 1998, one year before the launch of the single currency, this deviation stood at more than 130 basis points for overnight rates, at over 100 basis points for one - month maturities, and at around 50 basis points for 12 - month rates. since january 1999, however, these differences have rarely exceeded one or two basis points. • furthermore, there is significant evidence that euro area corporations are taking advantage of the possibility to appeal to a broader universe of investors in order to raise funds. as a result, the euro corporate bond market has grown significantly since 1999, and has the potential to grow even further, judged by a comparison with the us. in 1999, the outstanding volume of bonds issued by non - financial corporations was just 3. 9 % of gdp in the euro area and 24. 3 % in the us ; in 2006 it has increased to 12. 5 % but the us market is still one and a half times larger than in the euro area ( 21. 1 % ). • between 1997 and 2005 euro area residents doubled their holdings of equity issued in another euro area country – as a share of their total portfolio of shares issued in their own country and elsewhere in the euro area – to reach 29 %. instead, the share of euro area equity assets held outside the euro area remains much lower and increased only slightly. hence, since the launch of the euro there has been a portfolio reallocation from holdings of domestic equities to holdings of equities issued elsewhere within the euro area. • the share of long - term debt securities issued in the euro area and held by residents of other euro area countries has risen markedly. euro area cross border holdings of long - term debt securities have risen from slightly above 10 % in 1997 to nearly 60 % in 2005. • by contrast, integration in retail banking has been slow so far, although it has picked up in the last two years. with some notable exceptions, much of the consolidation in the banking sector has been the result of domestic mergers ; only in the last couple of years have cross - border banking mergers started to take place. in this respect, a number of euro area banks have considerably expanded their interests outside the euro area. however