Central Bank of Russia launches SWIFT alternative for domestic payments

The system will allow credit institutions to transmit messages in a SWIFT format via CBR to all Russia’s regions without restrictions and will be fully functional by May 2015, rt.com reports. According to CBR representatives cited by the same source, the cost of transmitting financial messaging will be comparable to those of similar services in the market.

In September 2014, the EU called for new restrictive measures against Russia. In particular, some European officials said that Russia should be disconnected from SWIFT. However, SWIFT itself does not intend to switch Russia off from the system.

The plans to develop a domestic alternative to SWIFT followed steps to create a national payment system for processing credit card transactions, after Visa and MasterCard stopped providing services for some Russian banks that were subject to Western sanctions.

SWIFT is a global banking transaction system used by most international banks. The information the system carries, including payment instructions, is securely exchanged between financial institutions. It began operating in 15 countries in 1973 and is currently used in 210 countries.