Is Ripple Ready? SWIFT, Payment Platforms To Enact Upgrade in Coming Months

As stated in an official announcement, global financial messaging service Swift has accepted its community request to start ISO 20022 migration in March 2023.

On Oct. 20, the ECB shared its decision to delay the ISO 20022 migration of the Eurosystem by four months, from November 2022 to March 2023. The Eurosystem consists of the ECB and the national central banks (NCBs) of the countries that have adopted the euro.

According to recent reports, the Clearing House Automated Payment System (CHAPS), a U.K.-based system that facilitates large British pound-denominated money transfers, is also set to implement the ISO 20022 standard come April 2023.

In the U.S., Fedwire has set a target of March 2025 for its transition to ISO 20022 messages, while FedNow, a new rail service developed by the U.S. Federal Reserve Banks, targets mid-2023 for its ISO 20022 implementation.

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Updated ISO 20022 timeline:

– Eurosystem Target 2: March 2023. Big Bang migration.

– SWIFT: March 2023, beginning of migration.

– CHAPS (UK): April 2023.

– FedNow US (ISO 20022 based): Mid 2023 Target. (Fedwire 2025). pic.twitter.com/4nqNvLWw2M

— Anders 🏁 (@X__Anderson) October 29, 2022

ISO 20022 is the de facto global data standard for modern payment messaging between financial institutions and payment systems.

Already adopted domestically in several countries, it is predicted that 87% of global financial transactions will be supported by ISO 20022 by 2023. This common language helps banks, financial institutions and systems realize end-to-end processing across domains and locations, necessary for interoperability.

Ripple leader in this shift

ISO 20022 is gradually becoming the global standard for the world’s cross-border payment flows. Ripple has been a leader in this shift, with its RippleNet network designed from the start with ISO 20022 standards in mind.

In 2020, Ripple announced that it had joined the ISO 20022 Registration Management Group (RMG) standards body, becoming the first member focused on Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT).

The usage of ISO 20022 in cross-border payments has been limited all the while. As a result, Ripple and its RippleNet clients became pioneers in adopting ISO 20022 for cross-border payments.