Russia connects 159 foreign partners to join international payment network similar to SWIFT
Russia is in discussions with other BRICS member states on interoperability of national financial messaging systems, while 159 partners from 20 countries have already connected to the Russian platform.
This was stated by Elvira Nabiullina, Governor of the Bank of Russia, in an interview with Sputnik.
"Russia has a financial messaging system as an alternative to SWIFT. A number of other countries have similar infrastructure. We are discussing the interaction of these platforms, but here the interest and technical readiness of partners are very important," - the head of the Central Bank commented on the question of whether the BRICS countries are ready to move towards the integration of national financial messaging systems.
“159 foreign partners from 20 countries have joined the Russian system,” Ms. Nabiullina added.
The Bank of Russia's Financial Message Transmission System (SPFS) was created to cope with possible risks that could arise if Russian banks were disconnected from SWIFT, an international interbank system for transmitting information and making payments that involves more than 11 thousand large organizations in most countries of the world.
Many other major countries also have their own state payment systems, for example China has CIPS, India has SFMS.