The article from Week 13 -
http://polit.ru/news/2018/03/12/swift/ Translated by google:
"US Treasury Secretary Stephen Mnuchin announced an expansion of sanctions against the Russian banking system. US President Donald Trump has already approved these plans, as a result of which Russia may expect to be disconnected from the SWIFT system, which will make it difficult to transfer money to foreign accounts, the media note.
The danger of restrictions in working with the SWIFT system became known at the very beginning of the sanctions wars in 2014. In fact, Russia had four years left to find an alternative system or even develop its own. As it became known after another portion of threats from the US on the strengthening of sanctions, Russia is ready to immediately switch from SWIFT to the new UNIVERSA system.
The system is developed by domestic specialists and uses blockchain technology, which makes it less vulnerable to hacker attacks and increases the reliability of all transactions' cryptographic encryption. In a world where all payments are gradually becoming electronic, the issue of security and protection against hacking is fundamental.
The creator of UNIVERSA is the Russian Alexander Borodich; now he is completing the testing of the system, participation in which takes many leading banks, not only Russian.
"It's good that Russia has had these four years and the financial bloc managed to prepare," said Ilya Grashchenkov, director of the Center for Regional Policy Development. - Of course, disconnecting from SWIFT is a serious blow to the banking system of the Russian Federation. Roughly speaking, the possibility of making payments from Russia to the European Union, the United States and other countries may be in question. In such a situation, when you intend to continue to survive under sanctions, and they are obviously for us for a long time, the only way out is to develop your system.
Yes, now UNIVERSA is basically the eastern direction, such countries as China, Malaysia, and soon Korea, India will join it. This, of course, will mean an "eastern" turn of the banking system from Western banks operating in the SWIFT system. However, it is possible that gradually it will be possible to establish contact within the framework of the new system, first with the Balkans, Turkey, and then with individual EU countries. After all, technologically, UNIVERSA, built on the principles of blockchain, is a more advanced system, in contrast to the outdated SWIFT. "
Let us remind you that SWIFT is a society of worldwide interbank financial communication channels and making payments. The owners of the system is a cooperative society created under Belgian law, owned by more than 9,000 banks from 209 countries, the office is located in Brussels.
After the events of September 11, 2001, the CIA, the FBI and the US Treasury got access to the financial information of the SWIFT network in order to be able to monitor possible financial transactions of terrorists. As a result, SWIFT was heavily criticized for its insufficient protection of customer data.
Annually through SWIFT passes 4 billion payment orders."
WOW
If Universa were to replace SWIFT in Russia, it the price would be could reached even $100
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