17 Jun 2022 17:26

Sberbank creating international system of settlements as alternative to SWIFT - Gref

ST. PETERSBURG. June 17 (Interfax) - Sberbank has begun working on an international payment system as an alternative to SWIFT and plans to complete its configuration within a year, Sberbank chief Herman Gref said in an interview with the Russia 24 TV channel during the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF-2022).

"As for international payments, we are now in the process of building a new payment infrastructure, an alternative to SWIFT. I think that within the next year we will create a fairly effective system that will fully compensate for the SWIFT payment system," he said.

Disconnection from SWIFT had no effect on the bank's operations, because by the time of disconnection, no more than 5% of all transactions were being relayed through the SWIFT system, Gref said.

For operations in Russia, there is the SPFS and the Sberbank FinLine internal system, to which almost all major institutions and clients are connected, he said.

Earlier, during the SPIEF, First Deputy Speaker of the State Duma Alexander Zhukov spoke about the need to create a new global system of settlements with partners. "Here we need to propose very serious issues related to the creation of a new currency system. Maybe we should try to go back and create a currency like the ECU [European Currency Unit] used to be or SDRs [Special Drawing Rights], which never became a settlement currency, because the Americans opposed it in every possible way and did their best to turn the dollar into a currency. But without an answer to this question, we can not move forward," Zhukov said.