BISIH and Monetary Authority of Singapore to enhance real-time payments connectivity

The Bank for International Settlements Innovation Hub Singapore Centre and the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) have published a proposed blueprint for enhancing global payments network connectivity.

This will be achieved via multilateral linkages of countries’ national retail payment systems. Titled Project Nexus, this blueprint outlines how countries can fully integrate their retail payment systems onto a single cross-border network, allowing customers to make cross-border transfers instantly and securely via their mobile phones or internet devices.

The Nexus blueprint comprises Nexus Gateways, to be developed and implemented by the operators of participating countries’ national payment systems, will serve to coordinate compliance, foreign exchange conversion, message translation and the sequencing of payments among all participants. These gateways will be predicated on a common set of technical standards, functionalities and operational guidelines set out within the proposal.

Project Nexus is trying to achieve the equivalent of internet protocols for payments systems, according to Market Screener. That means creating a model through which any country can join by adopting certain technical and governance requirements. The Nexus blueprint was developed through consultation with multiple central banks and financial institutions across the globe.