Also European merchants who need to accept payments from non-Europeans need to accept Visa and Mastercard.

Of course but they can support an EU standard as well. It's not mutually exclusive.

The big benefit is that all internal EU card transactions are no longer routed via US companies which is quite ridiculous.

	▲	graemep an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Internal transactions all over the world are routed through US companies. I have paid using Visa or Mastercard at some point in Australia, Indonesia, India, Frnce, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Dubai..... its not exclusive, but there is a problem with network effects. From the point of view of a business why should they add support for a new payment system no one users, from the point of view of consumers why should they sign up to a new system that no one accepts? As I said in another comment the most likely alternative is a more decentralised system that all countries/currency blocks that want sovereign payments can get behind.