Russian SWIFT will dock with analogues for cross-border settlements

According to Vedomosti, the day before, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, during a meeting of the heads of government of the SCO countries, proposed developing their own system for conducting interbank payments and electronic exchange of financial information, which would allow not to depend on third countries in the financial sector. For cross-border payments, national interbank telecommunications platforms can be used. The docking of national settlement systems will simplify the use of the platform for banks of counterparty countries, since the work will be carried out on the basis of the national payment infrastructure.

Docking occurs with the help of network gateways, which they recode payment messages from one format to another. Currently, the idea is in its initial stage, and it is "not easy", because the task is not to create an alternative to SWIFT, but to develop a system that allows you to work in national currencies.

After the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine, Western countries demanded that Russia be cut off from SWIFT. A number of Russian banks fell under the restrictions, then the refusal became widespread. In mid-October, European banks began to massively stop accepting SWIFT payments from Russia. In June, the head of the Central Bank of Russia, Elvira Nabiullina, announced that 70 banks from 12 countries would join the Financial Message Transfer System, the Russian analogue of the SWIFT interbank communications system.