 Russia's central bank headquarters in Moscow (Photo: VNA) |
Several Russian banks have been banned from the SWIFT international payments network, hampering their efforts to move money outside of Russia.
A messaging system developed by Russia’s central bank - System for Transfer of Financial Messages (SPFS) - should enable the flow of domestic interbank traffic, but has limitations on the timing, size, and complexity of transactions it can process.
Connecting to China’s CIPS payment platform is a possible option. However, China’s platform can only be used for settling payments in yuan.
Anatoly Aksakov, head of the financial committee in Russia’s lower house of parliament, said establishing cooperation between the Russian and Chinese financial messaging systems is needed to get rid of risks associated with maintaining trade turnover. The central banks of Russia and China are cooperating on this, he said, adding that he believes the current situation will stimulate the necessary processes.