More than $330 billion is sent daily via SWIFT.
US and EU countries are considering the possibility of disconnecting the Russian Federation from the system of international bank payments SWIFT. This step could have a strong blow to the Russian economy, stopping the financial operations of businesses and banks.
What is SWIFT and how its shutdown will affect the Russian Federation.< /p>
SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications) allows you to make payments around the world and receive data about these transactions. More than 11 thousand companies and organizations around the world are connected to the system. More than 330 billion dollars are sent daily through SWIFT.
According to «Rosswift», in the Russian Federation, 291 banks in 48 cities were connected to SWIFT by the beginning of the year. The aggressor country was ranked 13th in terms of message traffic in the system two years ago. Disconnection from it threatens Russian banks and their clients with blocking and restricting access to financial markets around the world.
It will be much more difficult for Russian business to carry out export-import operations and receive loans from foreign companies. It may also discourage local investors from dealing with Russian debt.
Russia's military intervention in Ukraine has forced even those countries that were previously opposed to imposing such sanctions against Moscow to reconsider their opinion on this issue. Western countries ambiguously assessed the blocking of SWIFT as a measure against the Kremlin regime.
US President Joe Biden, even after the invasion, said that the sanctions against Russian banks are quite tough, and therefore disconnecting from SWIFT is not so important. Nevertheless, according to Bloomberg, the White House administration again returned to discussing this issue, starting negotiations with the US Federal Reserve System.
In addition, the authorities of Cyprus and Italy announced their readiness to participate in disconnecting the Russian Federation from SWIFT, previously skeptical of the idea. Hungary also said that they did not intend to prevent the imposition of this sanction against the aggressor.
The countries cannot make such a decision unilaterally — neither the US nor the EU. SWIFT, as an organization, will isolate the Russian Federation from its system only if all countries support this decision.
There have already been precedents in the world when Iran fell under such sanctions in 2012. It was one of the measures aimed at containing its nuclear program. The unprecedented aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, threatening consequences for the whole of Europe, is clearly a much greater reason to impose such sanctions now.