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💸 Is the SWIFT payment system bound to end?

💸 Is the SWIFT payment system bound to end?

We have been hearing a lot about it lately as over the past few days, the United States, EU and its allies have frozen hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian assets and cut them off from SWIFT.

March 03, 2022

We have been hearing a lot about it lately as over the past few days, the United States, EU and its allies have frozen hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian assets that are held by their own financial institutions, removed Russian banks from SWIFT, and made many types of foreign investment in the country exceedingly difficult, if not impossible.

For Russia, one of the alternatives is the Yuan payment system. This system is known as CIPS, a payment system which is barely used by 672 indirect and 76 direct participants, including some Russian institutions. Meanwhile the 50-year-old Belgium-based SWIFT is used by more than 11,000 companies and organizations around the world.

As Russia is cut off from the Swift system, the reliance on China to circumvent sanctions is growing substantially. It will also be interesting to see if trading to China from the rest of the world increases as it becomes a bridge for Russian goods and services in and out of the country which will undermine the sanctions impose on Russia.

Crypto is playing a major financial role during this invasion. The Ukrainian government has collected more than $42 million in cryptocurrency donations as of March 3rd, including a limited edition NFT worth roughly $200,000, according to Crypto analytics company Elliptic. The challenge is how the country cashes in on these assets to fund its war needs. (WP)

The Ukrainian government has been able to convert some of the crypto donations to the local currency and use it to purchase drones, gasoline, and other much needed goods. Proponents argue that cryptocurrency has enabled Ukraine to raise money without the restrictions imposed by government bureaucracy or centralized Silicon Valley tech platforms, and that, the crypto economy is not large enough for Russia to completely sidestep the sanctions imposed.

Additionally, there is the UkraineDAO, a decentralized collective raising funds to address the humanitarian crisis unfolding in eastern Europe. It has collected more than $7M in five days. The DAO has released an NFT (image below) backed by Pussy Riot members, and the funds will be used to support non-profits and Ukrainians struggling to endure the Russian invasion, which is now entering its second week.

As this invasion develops we cant help but ask ourselves, what would the ideal global payment look like?

SWIFT revolutionized international payments, but it’s long overdue an upgrade. Thankfully, fintechs are stepping up and evolving the world of payments.

Potential Innovative technological:

Ripple is a real-time gross settlement system, currency exchange and remittance network created by Ripple Labs Inc., The company uses XRP as the ledgers native cryptocurrency which transactions are verified using a unique consensus protocol in which validators compare potential transactions to the most recent version of the XRP Ledger. On December 22, 2020, the SEC filed a lawsuit against Ripple Labs and two of its executives. The claim is that they traded $1.3 billion in their cryptocurrency XRP as a security without registering it with the SEC. Ripple and other parties have since countered with claims that the SEC is biased in its assessment. The ruling will determine the future of Ripple, but expect to see many similar chains in the near future.
Six Clovers, is a fintech founded by the former PayPal team members with backing from Borderless Capital and BCW Group. The new system is designed to allow organizations to perform true real-time payments via stablecoins. Six Clovers will leverage the Algorand (ALGO) blockchain to allow for transparent and cheaper payments. The goal of the network is to meet the demand for SWIFT protocol for cross-border payments from institutions and businesses.
CIPS or the Cross-Border Interbank Payment System, seen as the Chinese equivalent of the globally-used SWIFT, has become a buzz word in the domestic capital market and related industries. Shares of Chinese CIPS-related firms, covering payment, finance and tech industries, surged 20 to 30 percent in trading over the past two days, following a Western move to ban certain Russian banks from SWIFT. This follows Putin's decision to attack Ukraine.

⛔ Russian invasion of Ukraine????? Not really…

This is not the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine as many mainstream and traditional media outlets are leading us to think.

This is Putin invasion of Ukraine. There are hundreds of thousands of Russians living in and/or out of Russia who are completely appalled by this invasion and ferociously voicing their anger. (See video below).

For example, as we described above, Pussy Riot is a Russian feminist protest punk rock and performance art group based in Moscow. They just raised over $7M to aid Ukrainians and many other Russians are assisting the innocent citizens of Ukraine and those affected in Russia as well.

👀 Under the Radar

Waves is a multi-purpose blockchain platform which supports various use cases including decentralized applications (DApps) and smart contracts. Initially was set out to improve on the first blockchain platforms by increasing speed, utility and user-friendliness. Waves is synonymous with its founder, Ukrainian-born scientist Alexander Ivanov (also known as Sasha Ivanov).
Blaize is a blockchain software development company based in Dnipro, Ukraine. The company, founded in 2016, has a team of more than 25 specialists who provide, among others, blockchain, custom software development, and mobile app development services to small and midmarket companies.
4ire Labs is a blockchain and app development company located in New York City, with an additional office in Kiev, Ukraine. Founded in 2010, 4ire Labs' team of around 35 employees specializes in mobile app development, UI/UX design, and custom blockchain development. 4ire Labs primarily works with small businesses in the consumer products, media, and retail industries. A genomics research facilitator hired 4ire Labs to help construct a demo that was to be built on NEAR Protocol. The goal was to demonstrate the fundamentals of genetic file sharing using blockchain tech.
Inn4Science is a blockchain development company headquartered in Las Vegas, with an office in Kharkiv, Ukraine. Founded in 2016, the team of 49 specializes in blockchain, web development, and custom software development. They primarily work with midmarket clients, mainly in the business services, financial services, and marketing industries.
Unicsoft is a blockchain and artificial intelligence development company headquartered in Kyiv. Founded in 2005, the team of 120 experts specializes in blockchain, AI, big data, predictive analytics, cryptocurrency solutions, custom software development, web, and mobile development. They provide fully-managed and dedicated team services primarily in the supply chain and fintech industries.

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