• The World Savings and Retail Banking Institute (WSBI), of which Isidro Fainé is Vice Chairman, groups together in excess of 6,000 banks from all over the world.

• More than one hundred representatives from banks and technology firms hailing from 50 countries will discuss the technological revolution ongoing in the banking industry.

CaixaBank and the World Savings and Retail Banking Institute (WSBI), an organization that groups together more than 6,000 retail banks from around the world and whose Vice Chairman is Isidro Fainé, will hold an international congress in Barcelona on the future of payment systems, with more than one hundred representatives from banks and technology specialists due to attend.

The congress will be held on 13 and 14 April at CaixaForum Barcelona. Visitors will discuss the technological revolution ongoing in the financial sector, particularly in payment methods driven by emerging technologies for mobile payments, P2P payments, digital wallets and e-commerce applications. The agenda will also feature debates on how big data can be harnessed in the financial industry and the implications of new players joining the financial ecosystem.

Speakers at the event will include globally renowned figures and representatives from the European Central Bank, CecaBank, the German Savings Bank Association and the Independent Community Bankers of America. As for financial institutions, among the speakers and guests will be executives from retail banks and savings banks in more than 50 countries, including Sumitomo (Japan), Swedbank (Sweden), SNS Bank (Holland), AktifBank (Turkey), Bank of East Asia (Hong Kong), AFB (South Africa), BancoEstado (Chile) and HFC Bank (Ghana).

Key players in the payment systems industry will also be in attendance, such as Visa, PayPal, Global Payments, Le Compte Nickel, Cignifi, SWIFT and MyBank.

Antoni Masanell, Vice Chairman of CaixaBank, and Chris De Noose, Managing Director of WSBI-ESBG, will open the event. Meanwhile, the closing speech will be presented by Chris Skinner, a financial markets specialist who covers new technology trends in his blog The Finanser.

About CaixaBank

CaixaBank is the leading financial group in the Spanish market. It operates in banking and insurance, has investments in international banks and is firmly committed to pursuing growth. The bank, overseen by Chairman Isidro Fainé and CEO Gonzalo Gortázar, serves 14 million customers, operates a network of 5,251 branches and is the market leader in retail banking thanks to its strong commercial operations, risk-appropriate management, foresight and consistent innovation.

CaixaBank is a leader in technological innovation and has been a pioneer of new payment systems. It has more than 14 million cards in circulation and a market share of 21.3%. CaixaBank was the first bank in Spain to introduce contactless payment technology, with more than 4 million contactless cards now in circulation and over 200,000 contactless-ready POS. The bank has a 25% market share in the merchant services segment.

CaixaBank also serves more than 4 million mobile service customers, 3.4 million of which use the Línea Abierta application. Overall the bank processes 120 million mobile transactions on a monthly basis, of which 33% involve fund transfers. The bank also has 70 applications available, which have been downloaded more than 10 million times.

CaixaBank recently won the Innovative Spirit in Banking accolade at the 2014 Global Banking Innovation Awards, organised by the Bank Administration Institute and Finacle. Likewise, CaixaBank was named World's Most Innovative Bank by the British magazine Euromoney, for which it competed against banks from all over the world.

distributed by