SWIFT Set to Allow GPI Payments For Blockchain Platforms

According to a recent report, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT) has announced that it will start permitting distributed ledger technology (DLT) companies to make use of its global payments innovation (GPI) platform. The new commodity is expected to increase savings in terms of balance sheets and push the movement of collateral.

SWIFT and R3 Unveiled a Proof-of-concept (PoC)

This news comes after the firm in partnership with blockchain platform R3 unveiled a proof-of-concept (PoC) of a new path to interlink trade and e-commerce platforms using GPI in January. The product connects various trade platforms to GPI members enabling end-to-end payment tracking, credit confirmation, and payment authentication.

The CEO of the organization, Gottfried Leibbrandt said at the time that:

“Our new GPI platform is extremely interoperable and open, and we’ve always had links to other networks […] we are announcing later today a Proof-of-Concept with R3blockchainon trade, where you can initiate payment on the trading platform, and then it goes into GPI. So we’re exploring interconnectivity with a lot of things.”

In a bid to confirm if DLT can reduce the complexity of the management of shareholder meetings, SWIFT conducted a blockchain-based shareholder e-voting PoC with top financial institutions like HSBC, DBS, Standard Chartered Bank, securities software provider SLI, the Singapore Exchange, and Deutsche Bank.

An executive at SWIFT said that:

“The emergence of blockchain technology is a new opportunity to look at improving these [current] processes. It is also an opportunity for SWIFT to offer flexibility in the adoption of this new technology through the re-use of ISO 20022 based solutions together with a high level of security and resilience that our industry requires.”

Furthermore, the present SWIFT network and infrastructure was used to access, test and validate the applicability of the technology. This way no extra cost is incurred for testing.