With more than half of the world’s central banks actively exploring CBDCs, the global payments ecosystem is set for a major shakeup.

The effect on cross-border payments may have profound implications for Swift. At last year’s Sibos conference, Dave Birch, author and financial services consultant, went so far as to claim: “In a world of CBDCs, I am not sure what Swift would do.”

In a new discussion paper written with Accenture, Swift offers up an answer to this question. While CBDCs could see a new parallel world based on distributed ledgers and portable digital tokens, the paper argues that “there is little advantage in reinventing the wheel”.

CBDCs are likely to leverage existing payments rails where possible and new solutions will become an extension of current infrastructure, meaning that “Swift has a unique role to play in a payments ecosystem that includes CBDCs”.

In an effort to ensure that it plays this “unique role,” Swift is planning a host of trials over the next few months to test how its platform could interact with the cross-border use of CBDCs.

Thomas Zschach, CIO, Swift, says: “Making payments infrastructure based on CBDCs efficient and interoperable with the broader economy presents some new challenges, but the majority are the same as those faced by existing payment solutions.

“As a co-operative that is neutral and currency agnostic, with reach across 11,000 institutions in more than 200 countries, and oversight by central banks globally, Swift is well placed to engage closely in the debate and any future evolution of money.”