Hmm.. One Day After The Pope Announces Resignation, Credit
Card Payments Restored at Vatican
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. Is there a connection?? Did he have to step aside so the new financial system can be rolled out?? I think there's lot's of maneuvering going on behind the scenes that we are not totally aware of. Very interesting times... ~Jordon ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Vatican can take credit cards again February 12, 2013 
The
Vatican has sidestepped EU banking rules by turning to a Swiss company to
restore card payments in its museums after they were suspended over concerns
that the city-state was not doing enough to prevent money laundering.
Vatican
spokesman Federico Lombardi said Swiss card payment specialist Aduno had been
contracted to provide the service, blocked for the last six weeks.
"Credit
card payments in the state of the Vatican City are working again, and so
pilgrims as well as tourists who visit the church of St. Peter's every day
can now use the ordinary payment service, including paying for the Vatican
museums," Lombardi told reporters.
The
Italian central bank prevented long-standing provider Deutsche Bank (DB) from
continuing to offer payment services since the start of 2013.
The
Bank of Italy said it was not required to approve the new arrangement because
Aduno was not based in the European Union.
In a
statement explaining its decision last month, it said EU law prevented EU
banks from operating in non-EU states unless they had an adequate supervisory
system or were deemed "equivalent" for anti-money laundering
purposes. The Vatican failed on both counts, it said.
A
spokeswoman for Aduno, which is owned by Switzerland's banks, said the
company had started to provide card payments services at Vatican museums
Tuesday, and would offer online payments for the museum website in the coming
days. She said card providers MasterCard (MA, Fortune 500) and Visa (V,
Fortune 500) had given their approval.
Pope
Benedict, who announced Monday he was planning to resign at the end of February,
had made cleaning up the Vatican's reputation for murky finances one of his
priorities, introducing new rules and hiring a top Swiss financial lawyer to
raise standards to international levels.
But a
report last year by European anti-money laundering group Moneyval found the
Vatican still failing to measure up in seven of 16 key areas, concluding that
it still had work to do to prove the existence of an effective supervisory
regime.
The
Vatican bank's global reach, high volume of cash transactions and a lack of
information about some charitable organizations could make it vulnerable to
money laundering, Moneyval said.
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