Putin and Xi plot their SWIFT escape Now we’ve come to the crunch. And the catalyzing event was none other than US hawks floating the – financially nuclear – idea of expelling Russia from SWIFT, the messaging network used by 11,000+ banks in over 200 countries, as well as financial institutions, for rapid money transfers worldwide. Cutting off Russia from SWIFT would be part of a harsh new sanctions package developed in response to an ‘invasion’ of Ukraine that will never happen – mainly because the only ones praying for it are professional NATO warmongers. Russia and China have been experimenting with their alternative payment systems for quite a while now: the Russian SPFS (System for Transfer of Financial Messages) and the Chinese CIPS (Cross Border Interbank Payment System). It won’t be easy, as the most powerful Chinese banks are deep into SWIFT and have expressed their reservations about SPFS. Yet, they will have to inevitably integrate prior to the launch of the new mechanism, possibly in late 2022. Once the most important Russian and Chinese banks – from Sberbank to the Bank of China – adopt the system, the path opens for other banks across Eurasia and the Global South to join in. In the long run, SWIFT, prone to non-stop American political interference, will be increasingly marginalized, or restricted to Atlanticist latitudes. Bypassing the US dollar, on trade and all sorts of financial settlements, is an absolutely central plank of the ever-evolving Russia-China notion of a multipolar world.
Things change slowly... Then suddenly. It will be very painful for Americans when the dollar loses reserve status. Though perhaps it can be managed similar to how when the GBP lost reserve status.
Soon there will be multiple established SWIFT systems everyone is looking seriously about decoupling, about the countermeasure, about counter the countermeasure. Look at the GPS system, space station.... those are quite nicely decoupled.
By managed, I think this would entail a drastic lowering of standard of living. If you consider the entire economy now functions on just money printing, and the money you print all of a sudden falls out of fashion, then your only mechanism for keeping the ship afloat has sprung a leak. The US is of course full of resources and an able bodied population, but this would mean a return to first principles where living off the system isn't in the equation. This will affect not only the poor, but also the rich, and of course the government workers, and the useless politicians. It would basically be like coming to America fresh off the boat and having to work hard. I'm not sure if American people can adapt to this as quickly as lets say the Chinese for example.
I must say this is good for everyone. I can’t imagine if I retire and live in somewhere frugally, I have to deal with with SWIFT for drawing my IRA money. Everyone needs a backup system.
It's definitely a far better solution than all-out war, something Russia is tempted to try. Russia has so much expendable population and since it's effectively a dictatorship, popularity isn't the main worry. Things have to get very bad for Russians to rebel against Putin's regime.
Fair assessment. Russians are likely to have a pretty negative view of revolutions - its hard to draw a continuous time-line starting from the 1917 revolution to post-Cold War prosperity. A plot and deposition from within the Kremlin is a more likely outcome for Putin.
Didn't even know Russia and China were ever part of SWIFT which is itself one of the most if not the most inefficient and expensive money transfer protocol ever. Every single time when I need to wire transfer some funds, I curse at its speed and cost and every single bank that I deal with curses at the system too. Seriously from an efficiency point of view, if the Russian and the Chinese money transfer system is better, I wouldn't mind some of the banks that I deal with to join their system. This is the few times that I actually prefer a foreign system better than the US system.