Russian government proposes measure to circumvent western sanctions
The Brazilian government believes that the Swift network, the global service that enables international transactions, needs to be updated. The executive says the system is “very slow” and “costly”. It was used to impose sanctions on Russia over the war in Ukraine, preventing the country from receiving money from other nations.
To circumvent the sanctions, the Russian government has urged the BRICS, a group of emerging economies that includes Brazil, to expand the use of national currencies and integrate payment systems. The economics team is against the way the proposal is presented.
Erivaldo Gomes, secretary for international affairs at the Ministry of Economy, thinks it makes sense to discuss the implementation of a new payment platform. Globally though no specific solution for some countries. The reason: to avoid fragmentation of payment methods.
Within the economics team, the assessment is that an opportunity has arisen to discuss improvements to the Swift system. THAT Poder360 found that a payment through the platform takes up to 3 days. In other words, it does not meet the needs of the current economy. For example, Pix, which is used by a large part of the Brazilian population, already enables instant payment within the country.
A unified Brics payment system spanning Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa has been under investigation for years.
To circumvent the sanctions, Russia has introduced its own payment method known as SPFS. The country has also created its own card payment system, MIR, which went live in 2015.