# The New Great Game

By [DYLIT Chronicles](https://dylit.info/user/dylitmediabuzz)

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Why Is BRICS Exploring Cross-Border Payments? A Bloc Tired of Paying the Dollar Tax BRICS nations move a huge amount of money across borders every year, and most of it still runs through the same old route: convert to dollars, send it through SWIFT, let a chain of correspondent banks take their cut, then convert again on the other end. That's slow, and it's expensive. Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, plus newer members like Egypt, the UAE and Iran, together account for close to 40% of global GDP. Yet their trade with each other still leans on infrastructure built and controlled elsewhere. It's a strange mismatch, and it's the main reason payment reform keeps showing up on the BRICS agenda year after year. What's Actually Being Discussed At the 2026 summit hosted by India, the conversation moved from talk to something more concrete. Reserve Bank of India Governor Sanjay Malhotra confirmed that member states are weighing two main options. One is linking domestic fast-payment systems directly, so India's UPI could talk to Brazil's Pix or China's CIPS without routing through a third currency. The other is central bank digital currency interoperability, letting sovereign digital currencies settle transactions between countries without a middleman. Neither idea is finalized. Malhotra was upfront that discussions remain "at an early stage," and there's no agreement yet on a shared BRICS currency or a single unified platform. What exists instead is a handful of overlapping projects, including BRICS Pay, a messaging layer meant to connect existing national systems, and proposals for a Decentralized Cross-border Messaging System designed to work independently of Western financial rails. Sanctions, Costs, and a Bit of Self-Interest Russia has pushed hardest for alternatives, for obvious reasons. Its banks have struggled with payment delays even for trade with friendly partners like China and Turkey, as Western regulators lean on intermediaries to scrutinize anything touching Moscow. But sanctions exposure isn't the whole story. India sees real commercial upside in cheaper, faster settlement for everyday trade and tourism. China already has one of the most advanced domestic payment ecosystems in the world and wants that infrastructure to matter beyond its own borders. Even without a single unifying motive, the members share enough overlapping pain points, cost, speed, and dependency on someone else's rails, to keep the conversation alive. Why It's Harder Than It Sounds Building the technology is arguably the easy part. A prototype tested in Moscow back in 2024 reportedly handled 20,000 transactions per second, so raw capacity isn't the bottleneck. The real friction is regulatory. Five-plus countries with different banking laws, different compliance standards, and different risk appetites don't align overnight. The Bank for International Settlements has pointed out that connecting payment rails without agreeing on shared messaging standards and compliance rules just shifts the bottleneck from technology to paperwork. Then there's the CBDC question specifically: who settles a transaction, where does the risk sit, and how do you stop the system from becoming a workaround for money laundering or sanctions evasion? None of that gets solved by good software alone. Where This Leaves Things For now, BRICS is building plumbing, not a rival currency. The realistic near-term outcome looks like interoperable national systems working alongside the dollar-based system, not replacing it outright. That's a meaningfully different story from the "BRICS currency" headlines that circulate online every few months, and it's worth keeping that distinction straight. Whether these payment links actually launch at scale will depend less on ambition and more on whether five very different regulatory systems can agree on the boring details.   Sources BRICS Members Explore Cross-Border Payment System Links (IDN Financials, Reuters-sourced): https://www.idnfinancials.com/news/67297/brics-members-explore-cross-border-payment-system-links BRICS Seek Enhanced Financial Connectivity for Cross-Border Payments (East & Partners): https://eastandpartners.com/news/brics-seek-enhanced-financial-connectivity-for-cross-border-payments/ \ BRICS Looks to Build New Corridors for Cross-Border Payments (The Digital Banker): https://thedigitalbanker.com/brics-looks-to-build-new-corridors-for-cross-border-payments/ Related YouTube Videos BRICS Focus Shifts To Cross-Border Payment Systems | WION News: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBcRGMz1Zjs BRICS Launches New Payment System in 185 Countries...Watch Out Dollar!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJZ6fpt3wv4 BRICS+ Eyes De-Dollarisation of Global Cross-border Payments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qM-Zr5Gwols