Russian state-funded news outlet RT retracted a report that incorrectly said 159 countries had adopted a “new BRICS payment system” but not before the false claim spread across social media. RT misquoted a Russian official who said that 159 “participants” – not 159 countries — had adopted Moscow’s SPFS system for bank transfers, which sanctions-hit Russia uses as an alternative to the global SWIFT system.
“Big move coming! 159 countries will adopt the new BRICS payment system,” read an August 18 post on X, formerly Twitter, written in simplified Chinese.
The BRICS bloc of emerging economies — made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – has been pushing alternatives to international financial institutions like the World Bank and IMF.
Moscow has called for BRICS countries to introduce a common payment system and increase use of members’ national currencies for trade in a bid to free themselves from the dollar.
Russia has increasingly developed its domestic financial infrastructure, including the SPFS system for bank transfers and the Mir card payments system, after it was cut off by the West from the SWIFT global payments system over Putin’s war in Ukraine.
The X post shows an RT video report about the introduction of the “BRICS payment system” by 159 countries.
The incorrect RT report made the rounds in similar posts on X, Facebook and TikTok.
RT apology
A reverse image search of RT’s video found a statement from the broadcaster retracting the report (archived link).
“On August 17, 2024, Russia Today (RT) published news content on its official Weibo account — ‘159 countries will adopt the new BRICS payment system’. After verification, this was fake news,” RT posted on its official Weibo account on August 22.
“We apologise for publishing this inaccurate information.”
The confusion appeared to originate from an article by Russian state-owned news agency Sputnik, which quoted an official who said 159 “participants” — not 159 countries — had adopted Moscow’s SPFS system.
“Russia has a Financial Messaging System that is an alternative to SWIFT. Some other countries have similar infrastructure. We are discussing the interaction of such platforms,” Russian central bank head Elvira Nabiullina told Sputnik for its January 30 article — which reported that Moscow was discussing the integration of SPFS with other BRICS countries (archived link).
She added that “159 foreign participants from 20 countries” had signed up to SPFS.
Banks from Armenia, Cuba, Kazakhstan were among those using the Russian system, TASS news agency reported in March (archived link).
Separately, a spokesperson for BRICS Pay — a digital payments platform developed by the BRICS bloc — told AFP they were “not aware of any plans for a rollout in 159 countries as mentioned in the misleading social media posts”.
“The work on BRICS Pay is indeed progressing, but it will be a gradual and sequential development,” BRICS Pay said in a statement on September 6.
