History of the CPMI

In 1980, the Governors of the central banks of the Group of Ten (G10) countries set up a Group of Experts on Payment Systems, whose purpose was to take forward the work on payment system issues identified by the G10 Group of Computer Experts. One of the Group's first projects, a detailed review of payment system developments in the G10 countries, was published by the BIS in 1985 in the first of a series that has become known as "Red Books". The Group also analysed interbank netting schemes in the Report on netting schemes, published by the BIS in 1989. The Group of Experts on Payment Systems was chaired successively by George Blunden of the Bank of England (1980-82), Hans Meyer of the Swiss National Bank (1983-88) and Wayne Angell of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (1988-90). 

In 1989, the G10 Governors set up an ad hoc Committee on Interbank Netting Schemes (chaired by Alexandre Lamfalussy, then General Manager of the BIS) to study in more detail the policy issues relating to cross-border and multicurrency interbank netting schemes. Its report, published in 1990, contains a set of minimum standards for the operation of bilateral and multilateral cross-border and multicurrency netting schemes and sets out the G10 central banks' framework for the cooperative oversight of such systems. 

In 1990, the G10 Governors established the Committee on Payment and Settlement Systems (CPSS) as a follow-up to the work of the Committee on Interbank Netting Schemes, and more generally to take over and extend the activities of the Group of Experts on Payment Systems. The CPSS was set up as one of the permanent central bank committees reporting to the G10 Governors (the other main committees are the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and the Committee on the Global Financial System).

First in 1997-98 and then in 2009, CPSS membership was enlarged to include 25 central banks. In order to reflect this enlarged membership, the committee started to report to the Governors of the Global Economy Meeting (GEM) instead of the G10 Governors.

In September 2013, in the light of the Committee's standard-setting activities and the associated greater public scrutiny, the CPSS reviewed its mandate. The new mandate was approved by the GEM, which also endorsed the renaming of the CPSS as the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI). Both changes became effective as of 1 September 2014.

In March 2018, CPMI membership was enlarged to include 28 central banks.