The global financial system has crossed a decisive threshold with the full migration to ISO 20022 for cross-border payments. The long-anticipated shift became effective on 22 November, bringing the industry’s coexistence phase with legacy MT messages to a formal close and establishing ISO 20022 as the mandatory format for all international payment instructions.
The transition marks one of the most significant modernisation milestones in the history of global payments. By moving to a richer, structured and more interoperable messaging standard, the financial community has strengthened the foundations for faster, more transparent and data-driven payments that align with the G20’s ambitions to enhance cross-border transaction efficiency.
The adoption reflects years of coordinated industry preparation, beginning with the collective decision in 2018 to standardise on ISO 20022 for cross-border flows. Supported by the G20 and the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures, the new standard is seen as a critical building block for payment innovation and a catalyst for the next phase of digital transformation across the global banking ecosystem.
After introducing a transition period in March 2023, Swift has now completed the migration, reporting that 97 percent of payment instructions are already being sent in ISO 20022 format. To ensure no disruption during the final stages, Swift has activated a conversion service that will temporarily translate any remaining MT messages into the new standard, maintaining continuity across markets.
Swift Chief Operations Officer Jérôme Piens described the milestone as a transformative moment for the industry, emphasising that ISO 20022’s enhanced data quality will strengthen compliance, risk monitoring and operational efficiency. He also underscored that the new standard will support Swift’s broader strategy to create a universal, predictable and more transparent cross-border payment experience.
According to Piens, ISO 20022 will underpin the development of Swift’s next-generation payment scheme for retail customers and serve as a technical foundation for its shared ledger initiative, aimed at connecting traditional finance with emerging decentralised finance systems through trusted movement of tokenised value.
With the community now fully onboarded, the industry’s attention is turning from technical readiness to value creation. Swift is working with financial institutions and infrastructures worldwide to help them leverage ISO 20022’s enriched datasets for enhanced analytics, operational optimisation and new product innovation.
The global shift positions ISO 20022 as the common language for payments and extends the foundation for future-facing financial interoperability.
