Jaipur: BRICS, the coalition of major emerging and developing economies, is preparing to introduce its own cross-border payment system, BRICS Pay, as part of efforts to conduct international trade and financial transactions using currencies other than the US dollar.
According to Deutsche Welle, finance ministers and central bank officials from BRICS nations convened in Jaipur, India, in August to advance the BRICS Pay initiative. This new payment system is aimed at reducing reliance on the US dollar by facilitating transactions directly between national payment systems of BRICS countries. BRICS Pay is expected to become partly operational in September.
Currently, international payments, such as those between Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo, typically go through the Belgium-based SWIFT organization, which connects over 11,000 financial institutions worldwide. While effective, SWIFT has been criticized for its potential use as a geopolitical tool, allowing entire countries to be cut off from the
network as part of Western sanctions during conflicts.
BRICS Pay seeks to address these concerns by enabling direct trade between BRICS nations without the US dollar as an intermediary, potentially reducing geopolitical risks associated with the existing global financial systems.