BRICS Payment Task Force Holds Third Virtual Session — RBI Chairs Cross-Border Settlement Talks

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) chaired the Third Meeting of the BRICS Payment Task Force on May 12, 2026 in virtual format, as part of India's 2026 BRICS chairmanship. The task force—operating under the Finance Track—convened Track II and Track III representatives from all BRICS member central banks and finance ministries to advance the bloc's cross-border payment architecture. Discussions centered on local currency settlement frameworks, interoperability between national payment systems (including India's UPI, China's CIPS, Russia's SPFS, and Brazil's PIX), and technical standards for integrating central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) ahead of the BRICS Pay deployment targeted for the September 2026 summit. The meeting follows Indonesia's April 30 launch of QRIS–China direct settlement and advances the broader BRICS Bridge (mBridge) infrastructure that processed $55.49 billion across 4,000+ transactions by late 2025. India's chairmanship has elevated payment-system interoperability as a flagship deliverable for the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi on September 12–13, 2026.